Dr. Ciottone is President Emeritus of the World Association for Disaster and Emergency Medicine and a Professor of Clinical Emergency Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He is an Associate in the Department of Health Policy and Management at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and the Founding Director of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center Fellowship in Disaster Medicine, where he has trained over 140 postdoctoral fellows, many of whom are now in leadership positions in the US and around the world.

Dr. Ciottone also serves as the Director of Medical Preparedness for the National Preparedness Leadership Initiative at Harvard University, and as a committee member on the Harvard University Scholars at Risk program. In 2025 he was appointed Special Advisor for Medical Preparedness at the US National Center for Disaster Medicine and Public Health. Dr. Ciottone is a Fellow of the American College of Emergency Physicians, the International Board of Disaster Medicine, and the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland.

As a former member of the United States National Disaster Medical System, Dr. Ciottone was Commander of the Disaster Medical Assistance Team (DMAT) Massachusetts-2 when it was one of the first federal teams deployed into Ground Zero responding to the 9/11 attacks. He was a Founding Member of the US Department of Homeland Security and has been a consultant to the White House Medical Unit for three administrations.

Dr. Ciottone’s clinical and field experience includes 25 years as a practicing emergency physician and over 500 missions as a flight physician on an aeromedical helicopter service. He has conducted educational programs in more than 30 countries around the world and has published over 180 peer-reviewed journal articles on Disaster Medicine and Emergency Management. He also serves as founding Editor-in-Chief of his textbook Ciottone’s Disaster Medicine, now entering its 4th edition.

In 2017, Dr. Ciottone was recognized by the Physician to the President for “Outstanding Achievement in Support of the White House Medical Unit and the President of the United States”. He is the 2018 recipient of the American College of Emergency Physicians Disaster Medical Sciences Award, and the 2020 recipient of the American Academy of Disaster Medicine Distinguished Service Award. In 2024, Dr. Ciottone was awarded a Doctor Honoris Causa for his work in Disaster Medicine from Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier in France, and in 2025 he became the first Full Professor in Harvard's history appointed on the basis of expertise in Disaster Medicine.