Overview

MANISHA JUTHANI, MD

Manisha Juthani, MD, is the commissioner of the Connecticut Department of Public Health. Commissioner Juthani comes to DPH from the Yale School of Medicine where she is a professor of medicine and served as director of the Infectious Diseases Fellowship Program from 2012 to 2021. Additionally, she served as the associate program director for career development in the Internal Medicine Residency Program from 2017 to 2021.

Commissioner Juthani attended Edgemont High School in Scarsdale, NY, and received her bachelor’s degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1994 and her medical degree from Cornell University Medical College in 1998. She completed her internal medicine residency training at New-York Presbyterian Hospital-Weill Cornell where she served as an assistant chief resident. She also was a chief medical resident at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center from 2001-2002.

Commissioner Juthani came to the Yale School of Medicine as a fellow in infectious diseases in 2002. Her research focused on the diagnosis, management, and prevention of infections in older adults,specifically urinary tract infection and pneumonia in nursing home residents. She has more than 50 peer-reviewed publications in this field.

Additionally, Commissioner Juthani was the principal investigator of an R01-funded research project that resulted in the 2016 JAMA publication entitled, “Effect of Cranberry Capsules on Bacteriuria Plus Pyuria Among Older Women in Nursing Homes: A Randomized Clinical Trial.” This publication received widespread attention in numerous news media outlets including the New York Times and CNN. She also achieved an Altmetric Attention Score that placed it in the top 5 percent of all research outputs scored by Altmetric in 2016. In December 2016, the New Yorker identified this research as one of the most notable medical findings of 2016. Her investigative expertise made her a sought-after editorialist in high impact journals such as JAMA, JAMA Internal Medicine, and the British Medical Journal.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Commissioner Juthani was a leader in the response at Yale. She was a voice to help educate the public and was featured on CNN, WTNH News 8, ABC's 20/20, Connecticut Public Radio/NPR, BBC's News Hour, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, USA Today, and the Washington Post to name a few. Throughout her career, she has been inspired to protect our most vulnerable citizens and advocate for the ideal of health as a human right. This vision and passion are what she brought to the role of Commissioner of the Department of Public Health. She led the department through the second year of the pandemic and helped chart the course for how Connecticut residents would learn to live with COVID-19. She continues to lead the department in combatting emerging infectious diseases such as mpox and polio. As we emerge from the pandemic, she is committed to revitalizing public health by refocusing our efforts on the opioid crisis, lead abatement, gun violence, mental health, climate and health, maternal health, and drinking water infrastructure improvements. In order to do this work, she is committed to growing the public health workforce and partnering with local health departments who are essential partners in implementing public health policies. She sees all these goals through an equity lens which is essential to ensuring that our focus on health as a human right is maintained.

Read the news release from Governor Ned Lamont on Commissioner Juthani’s appointment here.

Commissioner Manisha Juthani, MD

Connecticut Department of Public Health

410 Capitol Avenue

Hartford, CT 06134

Email: dph.commissioner@ct.gov