
Dr. Alister Martin, MD MPP
Founder & CEO
Expertise
- Voting rights and voter turnout
- Civic health
- Digital Equity
- Addressing the opioid epidemic
- Behavioral economics
- Emergency medicine
- Health policy
Publications
Voting
- Why and How Civic Health Should Be Incorporated Into Medical Education
Academic Medicine - Civic Engagement as a Pathway to Meaningful Medical Student Engagement on the Social Determinants of Health
Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice - The Vot-ER Healthy Democracy Campaign: A National Medical Student Competition to Increase Voting Access
Academic Medicine - Civic engagement as a means to improve health equity
BMJ Open Quality - Health-based civic engagement is a professional responsibility
Nature Medicine - Health care-based voter registration: a new kind of healing
International Journal of Emergency Medicine
Opioid Epidemic
- Nudging Emergency Department Initiated Addiction Treatment
Journal of Addiction Medicine - Emergency Department Clinicians’ Attitudes Toward Opioid Use Disorder and Emergency Department-initiated Buprenorphine Treatment: A Mixed-Methods Study
Western Journal of Emergency Medicine - Emergency Department Treatment of Opioid Addiction: An Opportunity to Lead
Academic Emergency Medicine - Get Waivered: A Resident-Driven Campaign to Address the Opioid Overdose Crisis
Annals of Emergency Medicine - Beyond Buprenorphine: Models of Follow-up Care for Opioid Use Disorder in the Emergency Department
Western Journal of Emergency Medicine - Emergency Department-initiated Buprenorphine and Referral to Follow-up Addiction Care: A Program Description
Journal of Addiction Medicine - Clinician experience of nudges to increase ED OUD treatment
The American Journal of Emergency Medicine
Vaccine Equity
- GOTVax: A Novel Mobile Covid-19 Vaccine Program
New England Journal of Medicine - Advocating for equity during the pandemic
BMJ Leader - Expanding Vaccine Access and Overcoming Hesitancy
Stanford Social Innovation Review - Mobile Clinics Can Help Reduce Health Inequity
Scientific American
Dr. Alister Martin is an ER physician and an Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School and Harvard Kennedy School and was a former Chief Resident at Massachusetts General Hospital.
He was a former Biden Administration appointee serving as an advisor in the Office of the Vice President under Kamala Harris as an appointed White House Fellow. He served as a former Health Policy Aide to Governor Peter Shumlin of Vermont and Congressman Raul Ruiz of California. He leverages his background in politics, policy, and the field of behavioral economics to use healthcare settings as a place to build programs that serve the needs of vulnerable patients.
He is the founder of Vot-ER, a nonpartisan voter registration organization that has organized over 26,000 healthcare providers and 300 hospitals to help non-urgent patients register to vote. He is the founder of Get Waivered, a program that is converting our nation’s ERs into the front door for opioid addiction treatment and was instrumental in the organizing efforts resulting in the removal of the X waiver provision. He also co-founded GOTVax, an initiative aimed at leveraging a get out the vote framework to deliver vaccines directly to vulnerable communities via hyper-targeted vaccine pop up clinics. He currently serves as CEO of A Healthier Democracy, a nonprofit healthcare organizing incubator which leverages healthcare workers and healthcare settings as a place to build programs and movements that serve the needs of vulnerable patients.
Alister’s work has been published in journals such as the New England Journal of Medicine, JAMA, British Medical Journal, and has been featured in outlets such as the New York Times, the BBC, the Washington Post, BBC, and Scientific American. Alister earned his MD from Harvard Medical School as a Presidential Scholar, his Masters in Public Policy from the Harvard Kennedy School as a fellow in the Center for Public Leadership, and graduated Summa Cum Laude from Rutgers University where he was a Division 1 tennis player.
Media Appearances

Doctor Offices In Wisconsin Step In To Help Register Voters
