3rd International Congress on Psychopharmacology

Dr. DelBello is Co-Director of the Division of Bipolar Disorders Research, Vice-Chair of the Clinical Research Department of Psychiatry, and Associate Professor of Psychiatry, Pediatrics, and Psychology at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine. Additionally, she is Director of Research Training and Education in the Division of Child Psychiatry at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati, Ohio.

Dr. DelBello received her medical degree at the University of Rochester School of Medicine and completed her postgraduate education through psychiatry residencies at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine and Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic of the New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center in New York City. Dr. DelBello completed a clinical fellowship in child and adolescent psychiatry at Children's Hospital Medical Center in Cincinnati and a research fellowship at the Bipolar and Psychotic Disorders Research Program in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine.

Dr. DelBello's primary research interests include the neurophysiology and neuropharmacology of pediatric bipolar disorder and the study of longitudinal outcomes of bipolar disorder. She is an accomplished speaker and lectures nationally and internationally about pediatric and adult bipolar disorder diagnosis, treatment, and management. In addition, Dr. DelBello has authored numerous peer-reviewed journal articles, book chapters, and abstracts and has been principal or co-investigator on many pivotal clinical trials.

S. Nassir Ghaemi MD MPH is a psychiatric researcher with expertise in bipolar disorder and psychopharmacology. He also has interests and training in philosophy and public health. His research has helped identify, the common misdiagnosis of bipolar disorder as unipolar depression, the contours of the nosology of the bipolar spectrum and the limitations of antidepressant use in bipolar disorder. He has also contributed conceptual articles about the limitations of the biopsychosocial model and of psychiatric eclecticism, and statistical methods in clinical research studies of bipolar disorder.
He is the author of The Concepts of Psychiatry: A Pluralistic Approach to the Mind and Mental Illness (Baltimore, Maryland: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003, 2007). His most recent book is the 2nd edition of Mood Disorders: A Practical Guide (Baltimore, Maryland: Lippincott, Williams, and Wilkins; 2003, 2007).
He has also edited or co-edited Bipolar Depression (Washington DC: American Psychiatric Press, 2006) and Polypharmacy in Psychiatry (New York: Marcel Dekker, 2002), has published over 100 scientific articles or book chapters, and serves on the editorial board of numerous journals.
A prior recipient of a Research Career Development Award from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH), Dr. Ghaemi's current NIMH-funded research focuses on long-term outcome with antidepressants in bipolar disorder. He has also been a principal investigator in a number of pivotal clinical trials for new agents for bipolar disorder.
He also serves on the executive committee of the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry; is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association; and has served as chairman of the Diagnostic Guidelines Task Force of the International Society for Bipolar Disorders (2005-2008).
Dr. Ghaemi obtained his medical degree at the Medical College of Virginia (MCV) in Richmond, completed a medical internship at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) in Boston, psychiatry residency at McLean Hospital in Belmont, Massachusetts, and a research psychopharmacology fellowship in mood disorders at MGH, followed by faculty positions at George Washington University, Harvard Medical School, and Emory University.
He also received a Master of Arts degree in philosophy from Tufts University in 2001 and a Master of Public Health degree in the Clinical Effectiveness Program from the Harvard School of Public Health in 2004.

Lee Wei Lim obtained his Doctor of Medicine at the Crimean State Medical University, Ukraine. Later, he completed his master degree in affective neuroscience at the Universities of Maastricht and Florence. He was then appointed as a Marie Curie Fellow and obtained his PhD degree in Neuroscience at Maastricht University, the Netherlands. His main research works were focused on the electrophysiology aspect of deep brain stimulation and immunohistochemistry of the periaqueductal gray in fear and anxiety disorders. He was also awarded as a Kootstra's Postdoc Fellow to continue his scientific career in the arena of translational neuroscience from the laboratory findings to the clinical application. He is currently working as a research scientist in the field of electrophysiology for mood and anxiety disorders in the departments of neuroscience and neurosurgery of Maastricht University.

Herbert Y. Meltzer, MD, is Bixler/May/Johnson Professor of Psychiatry and Pharmacology and Director of the Psychobiology Program for Translational Research at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, in Nashville, Tennessee. He is also Director of the Schizophrenia Program of Centerstone, a mental health system in Nashville, Chair of the Young Investigator Grant Review for NARSAD. He served as chairman of the International Psychopharmacology Algorithm Project (www.IPAP.org). Dr. Meltzer received his medical degree from Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. His decades of research on schizophrenia encompass a wide range of investigation: clinical and basic pharmacology, genetics, suicide prevention, and alleviation of cognitive impairment. Dr. Meltzer has been president of the collegiums International Neuro-Psychopharmacologicum (CNP) and the American college of Neropsychopharmacology (ACNP). He served as editor of Psychopharmacology: The Third Generation of Progress and coeditor of the ACNP journal, Neuropsychopharmacology, and he is a member of the editorial board of numerous scientific journals. Dr. Meltzer is the recipient of the Efron n andPaul Hoch Awards of the ACNP, the Noyes Prize of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the Edward J. Sachar Award from Columbia University, the Lieber Prize for Schizophrenia Research from NARSAD, the Stanley Dean Award for Research in Schizophrenia of the American College of Psychiatry, the Gold Medal Award of the Society of Biological Psychiatry, the Earl Sutherland Prize for Achievement in Research of Vanderbilt University (2004), the Research Prize of the American Psychiatric Association (2005), and the Grant Liddle Award for Clinical Research from Vanderbilt University (2008). Dr. Meltzer is a member of the editorial board of five scientific journals. His research interests include: clinical and basic psychopharmacology, with an emphasis on antipsychotic drug efficacy, safety and tolerability, the mechanism of action of antipsychotic drugs, genetic factors in schizophrenia and pharmacogenomics, prevention of suicide in schizophrenia, and cognitive impairment in schizophrenia.

Donald L. Hugh Myrick, MD, is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry in the Center for Drug and Alcohol Programs at the Medical University of South Carolina. Dr. Myrick currently serves as the Medical Director of the Center for Drug and Alcohol Programs. In addition, he is the Associate Director of the Mental Health Service Line at the Veterans Administration Medical Center in Charleston.
Dr. Myrick's research interests include the pharmacological treatment of addictive disorders. Specifically, he has completed trials using anticonvulsant agents in the treatment of alcohol withdrawal, alcoholism, and cocaine dependence. In addition, Dr. Myrick was awarded a K Award by (National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism) NIAAA to use neuroimaging to determine the neuronal networks associated with craving.
Dr. Myrick has written manuscripts and book chapters on the pharmacotherapy of substance abuse and dual diagnosis, and he speaks frequently on these topics at major association meetings. He is actively involved in intramural committees and mentoring activities as well professional organizations such as the American Psychiatric Association, the Research Society on Alcoholism, and the American Academy of Addiction Psychiatry.

Positions and Employment:
07/1992 - 10/1992 Intern in Psychiatry; Hopital de la Croix Jel ElDib - Lebanon
11/1992 - 04/1993 Intern in Psychiatry; Hopital Charles-Foix, Unite de Psychogeriatrie; 7, Avenue de la Republique, 94205 Ivry sur Seine - France
12/1992 - 06/1993 Intern in Psychiatry; Institut Paul Silvadon, 23, Rue de la Rochefoucauld, 75009 Paris - France
12/1992 - 06/1993 Anatomy & Development of Cognitive Functions, Rene Descartes, Ecole de Medecine- Paris V, Paris 75005, France.
12/1993 - 06/1997 Resident in Psychiatry; Baylor College of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry; One Baylor Plaza, Houston, TX 77030
07/1997 - 06/1999 Research Fellow in Neuroimaging & Psychopharmacology; Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC), Department of Psychiatry; 171 Ashley Avenue, Charleston, SC 29425
07/1999 - 06/2000 Research Associate - Medical Director, Brain Stimulation Laboratory; MUSC.
07/2000 - 06/2005 Assistant Professor - Medical Director, Brain Stimulation Laboratory; MUSC
07/2006- Present Associate Professor, Department of Psychiatry (tenure in Jan 07)
Director, Mood Disorder Program; Medical Director, Brain Stimulation Laboratory; MUSC
10/2007- Present Associate Professor, Department of Physiology and Neuroscience
Honors:
AOA Member; The Texas Psychiatric Physicians Association; Best resident's paper award for 1997.; Selected to participate in a Colloquium for Young Investigators at the Annual Meeting of the American Psychiatric Association in Toronto (in the area of functional neuroimaging).; Health Emotion Research Institute Travel Award 5th Annual Wisconsin Symposium on Emotion.; Fellow Award. The 7th World Congress of Biological Psychiatry. ; Future Leaders of Psychiatry Travel Award 5th Annual Meeting West Palm Beach Florida; American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP) Travel Award 2004; Health Science Foundation Developing Scholar Award 2005 (MUSC). NARSAD Independent Investigator Award 2006.

Dr. Jimmi Nielsen was graduated from the University of Southern Denmark. He continued his education about "Management course and training course" at Danish Emergency Management Agency. He worked at Brondersley Psychiatric Hospital, Aalborg Psychiatric Hospital and Aarhus University Pscychiatric Hospital. He is chairman of Danish Clinical Psychopharmacology Society since 2008. He has some publications focusing on antipsychotics and their side-effects, suicide risk in schizophrenia, receptor gene variation and schizophrenia, prescription of psychotrophics. He published two book chapters named as "Changes in hospitalization and suicide rates in schizophrenia. Suicide in schizophrenia.New York: Nova Publishers Inc; 2006" and "The Spectrum of Cardiovascular Diseases in Schizophrenia. Medical illness in Schizophrenia, American Psychiatric Publishing 2008". Augmenting clozapine with sertindole- a double-blinded randomized placebo study (SERCLOZ), Olanzapine vs. sertindole - a double-blinded head-to-head comparison (SEROLA), The retrospective clozapine database - A multicentre case note study, Danish Clozapine Monitoring Service, The Danish Antipsychotic Database - a pharmacoepidemiogical research program, Cardiac safety of antipsychotic drugs, T-wave morphology are his ongoing projects. He teached medical students, doctors and nursing staff and is also reviewer for Progress in Neuro-Psychopharmacology & Biological Psychiatry & Indian Journal of Medical Science.

Dr. Nierenberg is Co-Director of the Bipolar Clinic and Research Program, and the Associate Director of the Depression Clinical and Research Program, Massachusetts General Hospital, and Professor of Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School. He is a graduate of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University, Bronx, New York. He did his residency in psychiatry at New York University/Bellevue Hospital in New York City. He then went on to become a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar at Yale University, studying clinical epidemiology. He continued his trek north to join the faculty at Harvard, first to direct one of the Affective Disorders Inpatient Units and then to direct the Affective Disorders Outpatient Unit at McLean Hospital in Belmont, MA. In 1992, Dr. Nierenberg joined the Psychiatry Department at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
He has published over 230 original articles and 30 chapters and reviews, and has been listed among the Best Doctors in North America for the treatment of mood and anxiety disorders since 1994. In 2000, he was awarded the NDMDA Gerald L. Klerman Young Investigator Award and then two sequential NARSAD Independent Investigator Awards. In 2005, he was elected as a member of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ACNP) and a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. Dr. Nierenberg helped plan, conduct, and manage The Systematic Treatment Enhancement Program for Bipolar Disorder (STEP-BD) and The Sequential Treatment Alternatives to Relieve Depression (STAR*D) NIMH contracts, two unprecedented clinical trials that, combined, included over 8,000 thousand participants with mood disorders.
As of 2005, Dr. Nierenberg is the Director of the NIMH Bipolar Trials Network, a new infrastructure for the next generation of bipolar disorder clinical trials, which has started an effectiveness trial of low dose lithium alone or in combination with optimized treatment. His primary interests are treatment resistant depression, bipolar depression, and the longitudinal course of mood disorders. Dr. Nierenberg lectures nationally and internationally, teaches and supervises clinicians and researchers, maintains an active clinical practice, conducts clinical trials, and is on the editorial boards of multiple psychiatric journals.

Dr. Osser is Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He is also Attending Psychiatrist, Associate Medical Director, and Director of Academic Affairs at Taunton State Hospital. At the Brockton (MA) Veterans Affairs Hospital, he is the Psychiatrist for the Domiciliary Residential Treatment Program and Curriculum Coordinator for Psychopharmacology in the Harvard South Shore Psychiatry Residency Training Program. His main academic interest is in the development of decision-support tools that employ evidence-based reasoning, for use in the clinical practice of psychopharmacology. He is an author of 75 academic products, including journal articles, software, monographs, book chapters, and abstracts. Over the last 12 years, he has received eight awards for outstanding teaching, and two awards from the Alliance for the Mentally Ill for his dedication and service to the severely mentally ill and their families.
Educational background: Amherst College (B.A. 1968), SUNY Upstate Medical University (M.D. 1972), University of Southern California (Rotating Internship, LAC-USC Medical Center 1972-3) and Harvard Medical School (Residency in Psychiatry, Mass. Mental Health Center, 1973-6).
In 1996, Dr. Osser, and McLean Hospital psychiatrist Dr. Robert Patterson created an internet-based interactive psychopharmacology heuristic, the Algorithm for the Pharmacotherapy of Depression. In 1998 they added the Consultant for the Pharmacotherapy of Schizophrenia. The Algorithm for the Pharmacotherapy of Anxiety Disorders in the Context of Substance Abuse was next in 1999. Updated versions may be found at www.mhc.com/Algorithms. In 2001, the website won the Kanter Foundation - U.S. Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality Award (internet category) for its potential to monitor and improve health outcomes through promotion of evidence-based practice. In 2004, the website won the Lundbeck International Neuroscience Foundation Prize for achievement in postgraduate education in Psychiatry and Neurology.
Dr. Osser contributes to other psychopharmacology websites and educational media. He is co-chair of the Schizophrenia Algorithm Project published by the International Psychopharmacology Algorithm Project (IPAP) (www.ipap.org). This is a joint activity with the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology (CINP). He also is a consultant on the PTSD and Generalized Anxiety Disorders algorithms on the same website. He is also editor of the schizophrenia section of Cogent Medicine (www.cogentmedicine.com) which features critical reviews of recent articles. He is one of the authors of an internet-based drug interaction program that was started in 1997. It may be accessed at www.genelex.com. He was one of the major contributors to the 4th edition (2006) and 5th edition (2008) of the Model Curriculum for Psychopharmacology published by the American Society for Clinical Psychopharmacology. He is on the editorial board of the International Drug Therapy Newsletter.
Dr. Osser discloses that he receives no grants or other support from any pharmaceutical firms.

Jorge A. Quiroz M.D. is currently a Director of the Central Nervous System and Pain therapeutic area at Johnson & Johnson, Pharmaceutical Research and Development. He is engaged in translational medicine efforts as a liaison between drug discovery and clinical research for compound selection and drug development in neuroscience. He occupies this position after being a Research Fellow in the Laboratory of Molecular Pathophysiology of the Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program at the National Institute of Mental Health, in the United States. Dr Quiroz received his M.D. from the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile while also completing a degree as a professional violinist from the University of Chile. He obtained his residency training in psychiatry at the Psychiatric Institute of Santiago. His research in translational neurosciences has focused on the study of major depression and bipolar disorder, particularly, in the role that new pharmacological agents have in cellular resilience and brain neuroplasticity. In addition, Dr. Quiroz was involved in the development of Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy research (MRS) at the Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program, an innovative effort to quantify in vivo brain molecular changes in patients with active phases of the illness. He had received numerous awards, including the "2002 Clinical Center Director's Award" at the National Institutes of Health, the "2003 New Investigator Award" at the New Clinical Drug Evaluation Unit (NCDEU), the "NARSAD Young Investigator Award (National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression)" in 2004-5, the "Fellows Award for Research Excellence Competition (FARE)" at National Institutes of Health in 2005, and the Vision and Leadership awards at Johnson & Johnson, in 2006 and 2007.

Associate Professor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School Director, Bipolar Clinic and Research Program at Massachusetts General Hospital
Dr Sachs earned his medical degree at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. He interned in family practice and psychiatry at University of Maryland Hospital in Baltimore, was a resident in psychiatry and Chief Resident, Acute Psychiatry Service, at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
Dr Sachs was Principal Investigator of the NIMH Systematic Treatment Enhancement Program for Bipolar disorder and is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. He serves on the scientific advisory board of the Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance and Chairs the Scientific advisory committee of the National Alliance on Mentally Illness. Dr Sachs Co-editor-in-chief of Clinical Approaches to Bipolar Disorder and serves on numerous editorial boards. Dr Sachs has authored over 150 articles, abstracts, books, reviews, and book chapters.

Dr. Axel Wuerz is a neurologist and psychiatrist in cognitive behavioural psychotherapy. He was bom in 1969 in Germany. He trained his basic medical training and neurology in Germany but have been living in the United Kingdam where he spend 2 years in neuroscientific research and then trained in Psychiatry. He is a member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
He educated in Applied Hypnosis at the University College London and in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy at the Institute of Psychiatry, London. He currently works in the departments of Neuropsychiatry and of Behavioural Cognitive Psychotherapy at the St George's Hospital in London as Speciafist Registrar.
Her main interests are Neuroscientific foundation of Psychotherapy and the use of Imagery in psychiatric disorders and in therapy.

DR ZOHAR is Director at the Division of Psychiatry and Director of the Anxiety and Obsessive Compulsive Clinic at the Chaim Sheba Medical Center in Ramat Gan, Israel. After graduating from Tel Aviv University Sackler School of Medicine, he completed a residency in psychiatry at the University of Washington in Seattle and the Jerusalem Mental Health Center in Israel. He also completed a fellowship in psychiatry at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland, where he was Acting Director of the Obsessive-Compulsive Clinic. A member of numerous organizations and committees, Dr Zohar founded the International Council on Anxiety and Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder (OCD), which is now entitled the World Council on Anxiety, and sits on the board of directors of the International Masters in Affective Neuroscience. He formerly chaired the panel for obsessive-compulsive disorder of the American Psychiatric Association Task Force on Treatments of Psychiatric Disorders. Dr Zohar has served The European College of Neuropharmacology in many capacities, most recently as President-Elect and Chairman of the Education Committee. He also has been elected to the executive committee of the World Federation of Societies of Biological Psychiatry. Dr Zohar is a co-chair of the DSM V-ICD working group on obsessive-compulsive behavior spectrum and is Chairman of the European Accreditation Committee in CNS. Dr Zohar is the associate editor of the World Journal of Biological Psychiatry and the international editor of CNS Spectrum, and sits on the editorial boards of several journals, including European Neuropsychopharmacology, International Journal of Psychiatry in Clinical Practice, and Neuropsychobiology. He has authored more than 200 scientific papers and has edited 11 books focusing on refractory depression, OCD, and post-traumatic stress disorder.