DEPARTMENT OF PSYCHIATRY

Hello Members of the Department of Psychiatry,

As we anticipate the arrival of Spring following the winter months that are upon us, we know that is a special time with new challenges and opportunities. Within the Department of Psychiatry, there are many accomplishments to reflect upon as we enter this new season soon.
 
We celebrate the new Faculty and Staff who have joined us as well as those who will be joining us over the Summer. These include clinician educators and researchers.  Let us also celebrate and thank our Faculty, Staff, and Trainees who continue to do amazing work in supporting our tripartite mission of academics, clinical services, and  research on a daily basis.
 
We expect to recruit strong residents for the upcoming PGY 1 year as the process is underway. Our psychology internship just completed a successful match. 

We are living through “interesting times.” There are profound changes in national priorities that are unfolding before our eyes. While some of them will potentially impact our research and educational programs, let’s work as a team with College of   Medicine and UIC leadership to steer these changes in the right direction and protect our faculty and our patients.

Thank you for all you do each and every day, and best wishes to each of you.

 

 

 

Sincerely,

Anand Kumar, MD, MHA

&

Presents

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Matthew P. Nemeroff Professor and Chair,
Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences
Mulva Clinic for the Neurosciences
Director, Institute of Early Life Adversity Research
Co-Director, Center for Psychedelic Research and Therapy
Dell Medical School
The University of Texas at Austin

 Moss Auditorium
College of Medicine Research Building (COMRB)
909 S. Wolcott Avenue
1:00pm – 2:00pm

Dr. Cherise Rosen was invited to co-chair and present at The International Society for Psychological and Social Approaches to Psychosis Conference (ISPS-US).  Phenomenology Panel: Psychosis at the Intersect of Subject and System.  University of Pittsburgh & Duquesne University. Pittsburgh, PA.  November 1-3, 2024.

Graczyk, P. A. (December, 2023). For students to achieve, they need to be in school: A multi-tiered framework to improve school attendance. Presentation at the Raising Student Achievement Conference. Oakbrook, Illinois.

McKay-Brown, L., & Graczyk, P. A. (March, 2024). Pathways2Participation – An MTSS informed    approach to attendance. Presentation at the 21st International Conference on Positive Behavior Support. Chicago, IL.

Graczyk, P. A. (May, 2024). Enhancing School Attendance for ALL students via MTSS. Invited presentation at the Building Hope: Finding Solutions for the Future of Attendance. A Journey Through Adversity and Trauma Informed Care Conference (Attendance and Trauma-Informed Care Conference), Indianapolis, Indiana.

Pijl, E. & Graczyk, P. A. (October, 2024). Improving School Attendance: The Role of School Health Services. Paper presentation at the 22nd EUSUHM (European Union for School and University Health and Medicine) Conference. Potsdam, Germany.

Graczyk, P. A. (October, 2024). A Multi-Dimensional Multi-Tiered System of Supports (MD-MTSS) Framework to Improve School Attendance & Address School Attendance Problems. In P. Graczyk, J. Sharpe, M. Brouwer-Borghuis, R. Halberstadt, C. Stacy, and E. Denny (Symposium Organizers) [Symposium] Charting a Course Together to Improved School Attendance: National, Regional, and Local Perspectives. Paper presented at the Biennial Conference of the International Network for School Attendance. New Orleans, Louisiana.

 

Dr. Dana Rusch:

*Presented at the 4th Annual CIMH Conference hosted at U of Chicago on November 15th on her   co-authored report "Debunking Common Misconceptions about Immigrant Communities."

*Created the "Coping with Post-Election Distress" that included data on immigration in IL and Chicago, tips for clinicians, and a community facing resource in English & Spanish for youth, parents, and families.

*Was featured in an article by Southside Weekly entitled "Chicago Advocates and Clinicians Come Together to Support Mental Health of Immigrants in Peril" speaking about the negative impact of misinformation and anti-immigrant discourse on mental health.

*Was featured in an article published in The New Yorker on February 7th "The Fears of the Undocumented: In Chicago, families are preparing for the possibility of being separated by deportations." talking about her clinical work and the IFMHA Program. Read More

 

Dr. Mark Rasenick Invited presentations:

* 11/23 “From Mental Illness to Mental Wellness: Quantifying Diagnosis and Personalizing Treatment for Depression”.  Anna Monika Foundation Berlin Germany

 *01/24 “Psychedelics as antidepressants: Cellular Models and Blood Biomarkers” Compass Pathways London UK

 *04/24   “A simple blood biomarker for depression and to predict antidepressant response”.BioHabana 24, Veradero, Cuba

 

Dr. Paloma L. Reinoso was recently elected  as 2025-2026 Director for the Illinois Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (ICCAP) to join the Board of Directors for the Illinois Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (ICCAP), the state affiliate organization of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. She joins Dr. Kelley Volpe, CAP Fellowship Program Director, who currently serves as Treasure for ICCAP in efforts to support and expand our clinical workforce to care for children and families in Illinois.

Araya, J. M., López-Silva, P., & Rosen, C. (2024). The narrative self-model in schizophrenia: integrating predictive processing with phenomenological psychopathology. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences, 1-21. 

Sabetfakhri, N.P., Cook E.H.: Novel approaches for treating psychiatric disorders of childhood onset. In: Charney, D.S., Nestler, E.J., Buxbaum, J.D., Binder, E.B., Gordon, J.A., Picciotto, M.R., editors. Neurobiology of Mental Illness, 6th Edition, 2024, pp. 919-931.

Dr. Jason Soble's co-edited book, Handbook of Psychological Injury and Law, was recently published. Dr. Jason Soble was a co-editor of a recently published book, Handbook of Psychological Injury and Law.

 

The Neuropsychology Service published the following articles:

Soble, J. R., Finley, J.-C., A., Phillips, M. S., Abalos, S. A., Valencia, V. A., Jennette, K. J., & Pliskin, N. P. (in press). Using depression and anxiety self-report inventory cutoffs to screen for     invalid psychiatric symptom overreporting during diagnostic evaluations for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder. Journal of Psychiatric Practice.

Leese, M. I., Finley, J. C. A., Basurto, K. S., VanLandingham, H. B., Piszczor, J., Bianco. J. M.,     Phillips, M. S., Cerny, B. M., Schroeder, R. W., & Soble, J. R. (in press). Analysis of skew, examination of intercorrelations, and determining the optimal threshold for performance invalidity when 10 performance validity tests are administered during a neuropsychological evaluation. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology.

Finley, J.-C. A., Robinson, A. D., Cerny, B. M., Ovsiew, G. P., Pliskin, N. H., Calamia, M., Ulrich. D. M., Phillips, M. S., & Soble, J. R. (in press). Examining the utility of the BAARS-IV scales asembedded symptom validity indicators for adult attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder evaluations. The Clinical Neuropsychologist.

Finley, J.-C. A., Robinson, A. D., Soble, J. R., & Rodriguez, V. J. (in press). Using unsupervised machine learning to detect noncredible cognitive test performance. The Clinical Neuropsychologist.

Finley, J.-C. A., Phillips, M. S., Soble, J. R., & Rodriguez, V. J. (in press). Detecting noncredible symptomology in ADHD evaluations using machine learning. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology. 

Phillips, M. S., Leese, M. I., Abalos, S. A., Shapiro, G., Bare, K., Orleans, N. A., Durkin, N. M., &   Soble, J. R. (in press). Are there race-based disparities in neuropsychological test performance and psychological symptom endorsement among adult ADHD clinic referrals? Psychiatric Research and Clinical Practice. 

Rauch, A. A., Soble, J. R., & Silton, R. L. (in press). Anxiety symptoms are distinctly related to working memory deficits in adults with ADHD. Applied Neuropsychology: Adult.

Heywood, A., Cichocki, A. C., Numerick, J. D., Dykins, M. M., Roth, G. E., Ulrich, D. M., Phillips, M. S., Cerny, B. M., Ovsiew, G. P., Robinson, A. D., Soble, J. R., Song, W., Pliskin, N. H., & Jennette, K. J. (in press). Trail Making Test - Part B discontinuation is associated with worse performance across multiple cognitive domains, but not with psychological distress. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology.

Phillips, M. S., Turchmanovych-Hienkel, N., Leese, M. I., Ramanauskas, B., VanLandingham, H. B., Gonzalez, C., Ovsiew, G. P., Robinson, A., Ulrich, D. M., & Soble, J. R. (2025). The relationship between subjective cognitive complaints, invalid symptom reporting, and neurocognitive test performance validity among adults being evaluated for ADHD. Journal of Psychiatric Practice, 31(1), 13-19.

Soble, J. R., Ovsiew, G. P., & Phillips, M. S. (2025). Performance validity tests in neurocognitive/neuropsychological assessments. In G. Young, T. Bailey, L. Giromini, J. R. Soble, R. Rogers, & B. E. Levitt (Eds.), Handbook of psychological injury and law (pp. 275-294). Cham, Switzerland: Springer Nature.

 

Dr. Judith Cook and colleagues published their research on transition disruptions among young adults with serious mental health conditions during the COVID pandemic:

Cook, J.A., Jonikas, J.A., Burke-Miller, J.K., Aranda, F. et al. (2025). Social determinants, mental well-being, and disrupted life transitions among young adults with disabling mental health conditions. Journal of Behavioral Health Services & Research. Advance online access.

A new manual from the UIC Center on Mental Health Services Research & Policy presents smoking cessation experiences of people with serious mental health disorders in their own words. Stories were chosen to illustrate research-based factors that affect quitting or reducing smoking in this population. Available for free. 

 

Cooper, JJ, Schildkrout B. Breaking Down Binary Thinking in Neuropsychiatry. J Neuropsychiatry Clin Neurosci. 2024 Dec 4:appineuropsych20240044. doi: 10.1176/appi.neuropsych.20240044. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 39628280.

Paige, K.J., Weigard, A.S., Ajilore, O., Phan, K.L., de Wit, H., Klumpp, H., & Crane, N.A. (in press). Acute effects of Δ9-tetrahydrocannabinol on computational measures of neurocognitive processes differ are related to recent cannabis use among adolescents and young adults. Frontiers in Adolescent Medicine.