AADPRT 2008 Annual Meeting

Plenary Speakers

Paul S. Appelbaum, MD
The Elizabeth K. Dollard Professor of Psychiatry, Medicine, and Law
Director, Division of Psychiatry, Law and Ethics
Department of Psychiatry
Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons

The 2008 Shein Lecture
Ethics at the Cutting Edge: Genetics, Imaging, and the Challenges of the Future

Paul Appelbaum has provided thorough and eloquent commentary on law, psychiatry, and ethics throughout his career.  Having trained at Harvard Medical School and the Massachusetts Mental Health Center Psychiatry Residency program, he spent four years on the faculty of the University of Pittsburgh and twenty years as the A.F. Zeleznik Distinguished Professor of Psychiatry at University of Massachusetts Medical School (including nearly fourteen years as department chair) before returning to his undergraduate alma mater, Columbia University, as the Elizabeth K. Dollard Professor of Psychiatry, Medicine, and Law. A sought-after lecturer, Dr. Appelbaum is the author of over 400 articles and chapters and has written or co-authored six books including Clinical Handbook of Psychiatry and the Law; Informed Consent:  Legal Theory and Clinical Practice; Divided Staffs, Divided Selves:  A Case Approach to Mental Health Ethics; Almost a Revolution: Mental Health Law and the Limits of Change; Trauma & Memory:  Clinical & Legal Controversies; Assessing Competence To Consent To Treatment:  A Guide for Physicians and Other Health Professionals.  Dr. Appelbaum has served as President of the American Psychiatric Association and the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law; and as Chair of the APA Council on Psychiatry and Law, and the APA Ethics Appeals Board among others.  He has been elected to membership in the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and has won numerous other awards.

Advances in neuroscience, including functional imaging, genetics, and related areas, will thrust our current residents into a practice environment where they will face unprecedented ethical challenges. They will have the ability to order predictive genetic tests for psychiatric conditions and the implantation of brain stimulators to treat them.  Imaging advances may give them the ability to identify patterns of thought that patients themselves wish to conceal. Demands for information and behavior control from courts and other government entities are likely to grow steadily. Dr. Appelbaum’s lecture will focus on the complexity of teaching trainees to confront ethical issues raised by the availability of cutting edge diagnostic and treatment modalities.

Albert ‘Skip’ Rizzo, PhD
Research Scientist and Research Professor
Institute for Creative Technologies and School of Gerontology
University of Southern California

Virtual Reality and Psychiatry: A Brief Review of the Future!

Albert “Skip” Rizzo received his Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from SUNY Binghamton. Dr. Rizzo conducts research on the design, development and evaluation of Virtual Reality systems targeting clinical assessment, treatment and rehabilitation. This work spans the domains of cognitive, motor and psychological functioning in both healthy and clinical populations. His cognitive work has addressed the use of VR applications to test and train attention, memory, visuospatial abilities and executive function. In the motor domain, he designs applications for stroke and traumatic brain injury rehabilitation.  In the psychological domain, his latest project has focused on the translation of the graphic assets from the Xbox game, Full Spectrum Warrior, into an exposure therapy application for combat-related PTSD with Iraq War veterans. Additionally, he is conducting research on VR applications that use 360 Degree Panoramic video for exposure therapy (social phobia), role-playing applications (anger management, etc.), and recently has used this technology to capture news scenes for future multimedia journalism applications. He is also investigating the use of VR for pain distraction at LA Children’s Hospital; is designing game-based VR scenarios to address issues of concern in autistic spectrum disorders; and is designing and evaluating 3D User Interface devices and interaction methods.  Dr. Rizzo has created a graduate level Industrial and Systems Engineering course at USC entitled, “Human Factors and Integrated Media Systems”. In the area of Gerontology, Dr. Rizzo has served as the program director of the USC Alzheimer’s Disease Research Center and is the creator of the Memory Enhancement Seminars for Seniors (MESS) program at the USC School of Gerontology.

He is the associate editor of the journals, CyberPsychology and Behavior; and The International Journal of Virtual Reality, is Senior Editor of the MIT Press journal, Presence: Teleoperators and Virtual Environments, is on a number of editorial boards for journals in the areas of cognition and computer technology (Cognitive Technology; Journal of Computer Animation and Virtual Worlds; Media Psychology) and is the creator of the Virtual Reality Mental Health Email Listserve (VRPSYCH). He has recently guest-edited theme issues for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback on “VR and Psychophysiology”, two new journal issues on “Virtual Rehabilitation” (in CyberPsychology and Behavior and in the International Journal on Disability and Human Development) and one for the MIT journal Presence:Teleoperators and Virtual Environments on "Virtual Reality and Neuropsychology". Previously, he guest edited a theme issue in CyberPsychology and Behavior on “Aging and Information Technology”.  In his spare time, he plays rugby, listens to music and rides his motorcycle.

Psychiatry is just beginning to embrace the possibilities cybertechnology brings to diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation.  Utilizing graphic multimedia demonstrations, Dr. Rizzo will discuss the possibilities presented by these new technologies for psychiatric applications.

Lawrence Smith, MD
Chief Medical Officer, North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System
Lawrence Scherr, MD, Clinical Professor of Medicine
New York University School of Medicine

The Future of Residency Education: Utility of the "Core Competencies Model" or Does the sum of the parts equal the whole?

Dr. Smith is the senior physician of the North Shore-Long Island Jewish Health System, responsible for the overall professional management of clinical, education, research and operational issues related to all medical and clinical affairs. He earned his medical degree from the New York University School of Medicine, along with a Bachelor of Science degree in physics from Fordham University. His residency in Internal Medicine at Strong Memorial Hospital was followed by military service as Captain in the Army Medical Corps at Fitzsimmons Army Medical Center in Denver.  He practiced General Internal Medicine at SUNY Stony Brook, where he served as Director of Education, and Program Director of the Residency in Internal Medicine for six years.  During the following 11 years, at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in Manhattan, he served as Dean and Chairman of Medical Education, founder and director of the school’s Institute for Medical Education, Professor of Medicine ad an attending physician. Prior to his appointment as Dean, Dr. Smith had been Vice Chair of Medicine and Program Director of the Internal Medicine Residency at Mt. Sinai. In 2005 he joined the North Shore-LIJ Health system as Chief Academic Officer and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs before becoming Chief Medical Officer in 2006.

Dr. Smith has held senior leadership positions in national societies for medical education and residency training, authored numerous peer-reviewed publications in the area of medical education, and has received many awards and honors from national and international organizations.  He is a Regent of the American College of Physicians, a Director of the American Board of Internal Medicine, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Biomedical Research Alliance of New York, and a member of the Board of Visitors of Fordham University.  In June of 2007, Dr. Smith became the first recipient of the Lawrence Scherr, M.D. Professorship of Medicine at New York University School of Medicine.  Dr Smith was recently selected as the recipient of the 2008 Dema C. Daly Founders Award by the Association of Program Directors of Internal Medicine, of which he is a former president.  On a personal note, Dr Smith, married to his wife Debbie for 36 years, is the father of four sons, an avid wine lover, a die-hard Yankee fan and the grandfather of Norah.

With the competency movement rapidly maturing, Dr. Smith’s lecture will examine the professional qualities we desire our trainees to demonstrate and look at whether we are truly assessing the attributes and behaviors that will culminate in excellent physicians.