Steven Safyer, president and CEO of Montefiore Medicine, which includes Montefiore Health System and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, has announced that he will be retiring as soon as a successor is found. The announcement came via a letter to his colleagues released June 28.
The organization said that Dan Tishman, chair of Montefiore Medicine”™s board of trustees, will begin the process to select the next CEO.
Safyer was appointed president and CEO of Montefiore in 2008. Before that, he held a variety of senior leadership roles, including senior vice president and chief medical officer from 1998 to 2008.
“It has been an honor to dedicate my life’s work to an organization that has given so much to so many,” Safyer wrote. “My entire professional life has been at Montefiore and Einstein.”
“Montefiore is, and will remain, in a league of its own,” Safyer said. “We are united in our conviction that the best health care is a human right ”“ not a privilege ”“ and I know we will continue to lead the way here and across the nation.”
Under Safyer, Montefiore expanded to become a network of 11 hospitals and more than 200 ambulatory care centers in the Bronx and Hudson Valley.
Safyer earned his medical degree from Albert Einstein College of Medicine and completed his internship and a residency in social medicine at Montefiore. He is board certified in internal medicine, as well as being a professor of medicine and a professor of epidemiology and population health at Einstein. He is a fellow of the New York Academy of Medicine, a founding member of The Health Management Academy and a member of the Healthcare Institute. He received his bachelor”™s degree from Cornell University.
Safyer serves on various boards of directors including those of the Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation, the New York Academy of Medicine, the Coalition to Protect American”™s Health Care, the League of Voluntary Hospitals and Homes and the Greater New York Hospital Association.
Safyer was included in the 2018 Crain’s New York Business Hall of Fame. When Crain”™s asked him what he learned as a young doctor, Safyer responded, “That social justice theme permeates everything. You cannot be successful without your health, and the determinants of health depend as much on your place in the world as on excellent care.”
Safyer was named to Modern Healthcare’s list of the Most Influential People in Healthcare, which also included people such as Rick Pollack, president and CEO of the American Hospital Association, Michael Dowling, president and CEO of Northwell Health, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, U.S. Sen. Susan Collins of Maine and President Trump.
