Mary Mercer, MD, MPH

Mary Mercer, MD, MPH is an associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of California San Francisco. She works clinically at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and Trauma Center (ZSFG), the only level-one trauma center in San Francisco and the acute care hospital of the San Francisco Department of Public Health (SFDPH). She currently serves as the program director of the Emergency Medical Services (EMS) and Disaster Medicine Fellowship, the EMS Base Hospital Medical Director at ZSFG, the Medical Director of Alameda City Fire Department EMS. Additionally, since early 2020 Dr. Mercer has served in various roles for the SFDPH Covid-19 Response, including early coordination of scarce resources, medical surge preparedness and response across San Francisco hospitals, clinics and EMS system and later as the Covid-19 Vaccine Section Chief, leading the city-wide vaccine distribution strategy.

Dr. Mercer’s experience lays at the intersection of EMS, public health and quality improvement. She previously served as the Director or Performance Improvement and Patient Safety for the Department of Emergency Medicine at ZSFG, leading a number of interdisciplinary improvement efforts for patient access, ED flow, cardiac and neurologic emergencies, substance use disorder, and other conditions. She is also the Co-Principal Investigator for Project FRIEND (First Responder Increased Education and Naloxone), California’s first prehospital naloxone distribution program, now replicated in multiple counties across the state and supported by a grant from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Agency (SAMHSA). In addition to exploring systems’ change and improvement efforts in emergency medicine clinical care, Dr Mercer has national experience in relationship-centered communication education and coaching, lecturing and leading interdisciplinary team workshops on communication and conflict resolution as a facilitator for the Academy of Communication in Healthcare. Additionally, Dr. Mercer evaluates national workforce and patient-centered efforts towards diversity, equity and inclusion in prehospital care and serves as the Chair of the Women in EMS Committee of the National Association of EMS Physicians.

Dr. Mercer completed undergraduate training at Harvard University in the history of science, followed by medical education at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons. She completed emergency medicine residency at Stanford University and EMS/Disaster Medicine fellowship at UCSF/SFGH and received a masters in public health with a focus on epidemiology at University of California Berkeley.