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Cincinnati Health Department announces new medical director

Cincinnati Health Department Medical Director Dr. Yury Gonzales
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Cincinnati Health Department
Cincinnati Health Department Medical Director Dr. Yury Gonzales

The Cincinnati Health Department's new medical director is no stranger to the job.

Dr. Yury Gonzales will oversee the city's seven community health centers as well as its other medical initiatives. He has been with the health department since 1996 and was previously medical director from 2015 to 2020, when he was also the city's chief medical officer.

Since that time, Gonzales has handled other responsibilities in the health department, including day-to-day work in the city's Price Hill clinic and an effort to reduce diabetes in Cincinnati. The health department says that initiative led to a 30% reduction in uncontrolled diabetes among residents.

Gonzales reassumes his role as director during a time of uncertainty for the city's health centers — including the potential closure of the Bobbie Sterne Health Center in Over-the-Rhine.

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He's taking over the role from interim director Dr. Denise Saker. She took over after Dr. Grant Mussman moved from director to health commissioner in 2022.

“All the members of the hiring panel were impressed by Dr. Gonzales, both in terms of his work when he was medical director a few years back and by the impact he has had and continues to have on the patients he sees at the Price Hill Health Center,” Mussman said in a news release. “He has shown his strong leadership abilities, and we are excited to have him resume his duties as medical director.”

Gonzales earned his medical degree at Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos in his native Peru. He interned at Good Samaritan Hospital here in Cincinnati and served his residency in internal medicine at Cleveland's Case Western Reserve University.

Nick came to WVXU in 2020. He has reported from a nuclear waste facility in the deserts of New Mexico, the White House press pool, a canoe on the Mill Creek, and even his desk one time.