Gato Ian Gourley is the Action Research Center for Health (ARC) Division Manager. He has worked with ARC for over 7 years. He is very excited to be supporting the newly created Division of Health and Society at ZSFG in order to further the ARC’s mission and continue its growth with the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative. He is extremely passionate about the ARC’s mission and is deeply committed to pursuing social justice and health equity. He has an MSc in Development Management from the London School of Economics and Political Science and a BA in Sociology from the University

Dr. Margaret Handley is a public health-trained epidemiologist in the Departments of Epidemiology and Biostatistics and Medicine. She is core faculty at the Action Research Center for Health and at the Benioff Housing and Homelessness Initiative. Dr. Handley’s research focuses on bridging the fields of primary care, public health, and health communication for improving health outcomes and access. She co-directs the UCSF PRISE Center, which focuses on applying implementation science methods to meet the challenges of eneven health outcomes and access to care. At BHHI she is one of the Principal Investigators along with Drs. Margot Kushel and Rebecca Sudore

Margot Kushel, MD is a Professor of Medicine at University of California San Francisco, Division Chief of the Division of Health and Society, and Director of the UCSF Action Research Center for Health and the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative. She is a practicing general internist at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital. Her research focuses on the causes and consequences of homelessness, with the goal of preventing and ending homelessness and ameliorating the effects of homelessness on health. She is the Principal Investigator of the California State Study of People Experiencing Homelessness (CASPEH) and numerous NIA funded studies on

Dr. Vijayaraghavan is a practicing general internist at the San Francisco General Hospital and a researcher in tobacco control with a focus on populations experiencing homelessness. Dr. Vijayaraghavan's intervention research stems from collaborations with community organizations. As PI of two grants (22XT-0020, 25CP-0002) from the Tobacco Related Disease Research Program, she collaborated with homeless shelters and supportive housing programs to implement interventions to increase access to cessation services and smoke-free policies among homeless clients. As co-investigator (PI Satterfield, DA034253-04) on an implementation and dissemination grant on a randomized controlled trial of computer-facilitated delivery of 5As for smoking cessation, she worked

Dr. Morris’ professional activities are grounded in engaging diverse partners in the development of evidence-based policy change to reduce social inequalities and improve health among underserved communities. As a Professor, Dr. Morris’ research focuses on applying epidemiological methods to study the impact of individual, social, and structural factors on disease transmission within marginalized populations. In particular, her work has focused on using qualitative and quantitative methods to examine social determinants of health within people who use drugs, including HIV and hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection, worldwide. Internationally Dr. Morris has collaborated with researchers to carry out HIV and HCV prevention

Ryan Assaf, PhD, MPH is an Assistant Professor at BHHI and the Division of Health and Society, a mentored faculty member in the UCSF Action Research Center for Health at ZSFG, a member of the UCSF ARCHES New Faculty Peer Cohort 25, and a 2026 UCSF John Watson Scholar. He received his PhD in Epidemiology at the University of California, Los Angeles, Fielding School of Public Health where he also received his MPH and earned his BS at the University of California, Irvine. He recently completed his postdoctoral fellowship at the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative, where his work centered

Shannon Smith-Bernardin, PhD, MSN, RN, is an Associate Professor in the UCSF School of Nursing, co-founder of the National Sobering Collaborative, and faculty at the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative.