Bipolar Disorder to be Subject of 31st Annual Biele Lecture at Jefferson
David J. Kupfer, M.D., Thomas Detre
Professor and Chair, Department of Psychiatry, University of Pittsburgh School
of Medicine, and director of Research at the Western Psychiatric Institute and
Clinic, will present “The Medical Burden of Bipolar Disorder”at the 2009 Albert
M. Biele, M.D. Memorial Lecture, sponsored by the Department of Psychiatry and
Human Behavior at Thomas Jefferson University. The 31st annual Biele
Lecture will be held Wednesday, April 29, 2009 at 11 A.M., in the DePalma
Auditorium.
Dr. Kupfer is unequivocally one of the
top luminaries in Psychiatry today. Dr. Kupfer received his bachelor’s (magna
cum laude) and M.D. degrees from Yale University. Following an internship at
Montefiore Hospital Center in New York in 1966, he was appointed a Clinical
Fellow in Psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine. In 1967, he became
a Clinical Associate at the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) and was
assigned as a ward administrator in the Laboratory of Clinical Psychobiology
under Frederick Snyder, M.D. While at NIMH, he also completed a diploma course
in community psychiatry at the Washington School of Psychiatry. In 1969,
Dr. Kupfer continued his postgraduate training at the Dana Psychiatric Clinic of
Yale-New Haven Hospital serving as a team supervisor, and in 1970 was appointed
assistant professor of Psychiatry and director of the Outpatient Division.
Bipolar Disorder to be Subject of
30th Annual Biele Lecture…/2
In 1973, he joined the University of
Pittsburgh School of Medicine as an associate professor of Psychiatry and
director of Research and Research Training at Western Psychiatric Institute and
Clinic (WPIC). Within two years, he was promoted to professor. He became
Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry in 1983. In 1994 he became the Thomas
Detre Chair in Psychiatry. At Pittsburgh he helped develop a model of service
delivery system that provided a disorder based focus for patient care. Not only
did this model facilitate clinical research, but it also improved the quality of
patient care and training. It has become a model that many other major research
and clinical institutions have followed.
During the 1970's and 1980's, Dr. Kupfer
stimulated psychiatric research within the University of Pittsburgh and
nationwide. As Thomas Detre Professor and Chairman of the Department of
Psychiatry, and director of Research at WPIC, he oversees the coordination and
expansion of investigations among the department's 200 faculty. He has promoted
widespread collaborations between clinical investigators in psychiatry and those
in more basic neurosciences. These studies are not limited to depression and
other mood disorders, but encompass virtually every psychiatric disorder and
every age group, from infants to the elderly.
Dr. Kupfer has been the recipient of
numerous scholarships and research awards including the Twenty-Sixth Annual
Award of the Institute of Pennsylvania Hospital in Memory of Edward A. Strecker,
M.D. (1989), the William R. McAlpin, Jr., Research Achievement Award sponsored
by the National Mental Health Association (1990), the 1993 American Psychiatric
Association Award for Research in Psychiatry, the 1996 Gerald L. Klerman
Lifetime Research Award (jointly with Dr. Ellen Frank), the Institute of
Medicine’s 1998 Rhoda and Bernard Sarnat International Prize in Mental Health,
the American Psychopathological Association’s 1999 Joseph Zubin Award (jointly
with Dr. Ellen Frank). In 1990, he was elected to membership in the Institute
of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Kupfer is the Founding
President of the International Society of Bipolar Disorders.
Bipolar Disorder to be Subject of
30th Annual Biele Lecture…/3
A prolific writer, Dr. Kupfer has
authored or co-authored a combination of more than 953 articles, books, and book
chapters. Dr. Kupfer's own research has focused primarily on long-term
treatment strategies for recurrent mood disorders, the pathogenesis of
depression and the relationship between biomarkers and depression.
Dr. Kupfer is the Editor of Current
Opinion in Psychiatry and the Associate Editor of Bipolar Disorders.
He also sits on the editorial boards of Addictive Behaviors, Archives of
General Psychiatry, Clinical Neuroscience Research, European Archives of
Psychiatry and Clinical Neuroscience, International Journal of Methods in
Psychiatric Research, Journal of Affective Disorders, Psychiatry Research,
and The International Journal of Sleep Disorders.
Dr. Kupfer has served as President of the
American College of Neuropsycho-pharmacology and the Society for Biological
Psychiatry, on the Council of Research of the American Psychiatric Association,
and is a fellow of the American College of Neuro-psychopharmacology, American
Psychiatric Association, and the Academy of Behavioral Medical Research. Dr.
Kupfer chairs the Task Force for DSM-V.
The Biele lectureship was created in 1979
to honor Dr. Albert M. Biele, an outstanding Jefferson physician, scholar and
psychiatry professor and friend to many at Jefferson. The lecture was endowed by
the Biele family and members of the Jefferson Medical College Department of
Psychiatry and Human Behavior. The Biele Lecture committee is chaired by Karl
Doghramji, M.D., professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Thomas Jefferson
University, and director of the Sleep Disorders Center at Thomas Jefferson
University Hospital.
For further information, call Danielle
Parker-Mangum at 215-955-6104.
Media Only Contact:
Ed Federico
Thomas Jefferson University Hospital
Phone: (215) 955-6300
Published: 4/17/2009