Professor Mustafa M. Husain, M.D., will end his faculty appointment on June 15 after three decades at UT Southwestern. Please join us in congratulating Dr. Husain on his many achievements as we wish him well on his retirement.

Over his career, Dr. Husain has served as principal investigator for major national collaborative, NIH-sponsored investigations to advance ECT strategies including the CORE Trial, Three Lead Placement (3LP) Study, and the PRIDE Trial. He also has led NIH-funded, multicenter, multinational, highly significant studies, including the Confirmatory Efficacy and Safety Trial of Magnetic Seizure Therapy for Depression (CREST-MST), as well as the PD- Depression from NIA and New Neuromodulation and Neuroimaging grants from Brain initiative, among many others.

Dr. Husain has assisted in developing and implementing mentoring plans for early career faculty and preparing responses to grant reviewer critiques on K-Award applications as part of our department’s Clinical Research in Progress program. He has also served as a grant reviewer nationally for the NIH, NIA, and NIMH and for the Brain Canada Mental Health Research Program, among many other roles for professional societies and journals.

He has mentored more than 25 junior faculty, several of whom have gone on to excel in their research and clinical work, such as Dr. Shawn McClintock and Dr. Paul Croarkin, who have received federal funding and built their own careers in neuromodulation.

He has also led teams of UT Southwestern researchers in work that is reshaping clinical practices in TMS, VNS, DBS, and MST brain stimulation techniques by helping to provide safe alternatives for the treatment of severe depression and bipolar disorder. He was the founding Director of the Neuromodulation Research and Therapeutic Program and has assisted our clinical leadership in streamlining the ECT program, encouraging and involving junior faculty in ECT research and helping our Interventional Psychiatry service become a highly recognized program nationally.  

Dr. Husain has had a long and distinguished career as a translational researcher and educator in brain stimulation therapies for severe affective disorders. We are thankful for his dedication to our department and his influence in our field.

NEW! APP Celebration Week Award Nominations

Nominations are being accepted for the 2025 APP Outstanding Achievement Awards through June 27 in the following categories:

• Teaching 
• Ambulatory Clinical Practice 
• Inpatient Clinical Practice 
• Leadership  
• Professional and Community Service 
• Scholarly Endeavors
• APP CHAMPion (non-APP leader/faculty/staff partner/advocate for APP)

Nominations are also open for the APP CHAMPion of the Year, which recognizes a non-APP leader, faculty, or staff member who excels in partnership and advocacy for APPs in their daily work.

UT Southwestern faculty and employees are eligible to submit to each category. Winners will be announced during APP Celebration Week, September 22-26.  

Clinical Psychology Doctoral Program Incoming Class of 2029

We are thrilled to announce the incoming class of 2025, who will be joining us this August!

A special thank you to the Admissions Committee, chaired by Laura Lacritz, Ph.D., and co-chaired by Aleksandra Foxwell, Ph.D., for their dedication and hard work.

Please join us in extending a warm welcome to our new students.

Leadership Positions Posted

We have several application opportunities available for leadership positions in our department--

Division Chiefs:

• Addiction Psychiatry
• Child and Adolescent Psychiatry
• Geriatric Psychiatry

Staff Roles:

• Manager of Marketing and Communications
• Research Programs Manager
• Senior Grants and Contracts Specialist, Translational Neuroscience
• Supervisor of Clinical Research

Please consider applying or sharing the application links with people you know who may be interested to join us!

CPAN Celebrating 5th Anniversary

May is recognized as Maternal Mental Health Month, a time to raise awareness, reduce stigma, and support the mental health needs of mothers and families everywhere. It is also a milestone month for the Child Psychiatry Access Network, as CPAN is celebrating its 5th anniversary! This month is a great opportunity to share resources, elevate awareness in our networks, and reflect on the importance of the work we do every day.

Eric Nestler, M.D., Ph.D., Elected to National Academy of Sciences

Former Chair of the UT Southwestern Department of Psychiatry, Eric Nestler, M.D., Ph.D., has been highly honored with election to the National Academy of Sciences. Dr. Nestler, a pre-eminent researcher studying the biological basis of addiction and depression, led our department until 2008. The National Academy of Sciences is a private, nonprofit institution that recognizes achievement in science by election to membership and advises the federal government and other organizations on matters of science, engineering, and health policy. We are pleased to celebrate this highly deserved recognition and the advances in translation brain science that Dr. Nestler has achieved. 

Kaltra Dhima, Ph.D., ABPP, a Boston native, earned her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at UT Southwestern. She subsequently completed a postdoctoral fellowship in Clinical Neuropsychology at Cleveland Clinic.

Starting in 2020, Dr. Dhima served as Assistant Professor of Clinical Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, working primarily with patients with movement disorders, clinically and in research. She is thrilled to return to UT Southwestern as a faculty member. 

Sam Baker of KERA News (NPR for North Texas) interviewed Maria Chahrour, Ph.D., regarding her research into the role of genetics in autism. 

Listen to the Audio / Read the Transcript

NEW! American Psychiatric Association Leadership Position

Abhisek Khandai, M.D. was appointed as Chair for the American Psychiatric Association Council on Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry.

NEW! American Psychiatric Association / APA Foundation Fellowship Awards

Congratulations to our outstanding residents who have received American Psychiatric Association / APA Foundation Fellowships for 2025-2026!

NAMIWalks North Texas 2025 Walk of Fame

NAMI North Texas honored our Psychiatry Team Confabulous for "energy, heart, and hustle" in its annual walk to raise funds and awareness for individuals and families in the community to access free mental health education, support groups, and other needed resources. Team Confabulous can continue gaining support until May 31. Please finalize any pending donations before then.

Pam Blumenthal Community Service Award

The Suicide Prevention & Resilience in Children (SPARC) team, including Mehak Gupta, Jessica Heerschap, Ph.D., and Betsy Kennard, Psy.D., has been selected to receive the Dallas Psychological Association's Pam Blumenthal Community Service Award for adapting the SPARC intensive outpatient program to the child and adolescent outpatient clinics at Metrocare.

The award will be presented at the Dallas Psychological Association's Spring Awards Banquet at MesoMaya on June 1 (register to attend by Friday, May 23).

Golden Heart Award

Jessica Churchwell, LCSW, was honored for clinical excellence in service to patients at the Richardson Clinic.

2025 Cary Council DocStars Grant

Jeffrey Schaffert, Ph.D., was selected for funding for the 2025 DocStars Award by the Cary Council for the research study “IMaging, PlasmA, and Cognitive Trajectories in amateur FOOTBALL players (IMPACT-FOOTBALL).”

OBI Sprouts Grant Award

The O’Donnell Brain Institute Sprouts Grants support trainees taking an independent role in formulating and investigating a new research question relevant to their ongoing study. Ruining (Rae) Hu, M.S., Neuroscience Graduate Student, Choi Lab, was awarded a grant for “Elucidating the Circuit Mechanisms for Somatosensory Regulation of Sleep.”

APA Poster Honor

The American Psychiatric Association's New Research Press Briefing selected a poster co-authored by resident Jasmine Liu-Zarzuela, M.D., M.P.H., reporting on research about music and mental health, for presentation and a news release at the APA's Annual Meeting.

Associate Editor for AJP Residents' Journal

The American Journal of Psychiatry Residents' Journal has selected Dhruba Banerjee, M.D., as an Associate Editor.

ISEN Travel Scholarship Recipient

Psychiatry resident Donald Egan, M.D., was awarded a travel scholarship to attend the International Society of ECT and Neuromodulation Annual Meeting.

NEW! Jeffrey Schaffert, Ph.D., presented a webinar on "Idiopathic Normal Pressure Hydrocephalus: Overview and Neuropsychological Outcomes" for the National Academy of Neuropsychology's Online Learning program.

NEW! In the General Session at the American Psychiatric Association meeting in Los Angeles, Jonathan DeVries, D.O., and Diana Robinson, M.D., presented with colleagues a workshop in on "Improving Management of Critically Ill Patients in the ICU."

NEW! UT Southwestern Medical School graduate and rising PGY1 in our triple board program Abigail Lewis, M.D., presented the poster on "Treatment of Catatonia in Bipolar 1 Disorder with NMDA-Receptor Antagonist Memantine: A Case Series," with Dr. Robinson at the APA meeting.

NEW! Upon selection from an international applicant pool, Enrique Chiu Han, M.D., and Christian S. Monsalve, M.D., participated in the APA's 2025 Research Colloquium for Junior Psychiatrist Investigators in Los Angeles. 

NEW! Christian S. Monsalve, M.D., chaired the APA's General Session "Comparison of Clinical Guidelines for Pediatric Gender Dysphoria: What is the Role of Systematic Evidence Reviews?" Speakers included Stephen Levine, M.D., Kristopher Kaliebe, M.D., and Kathleen McDeavitt, M.D., stretching the capacity of the meeting room with around 250 attendees.

Training program alumni, and incoming faculty members, Bernice Yau, M.D., and Matt Yung, M.D., presented with Adam Brenner, M.D., for the APA Meeting's Trainee-Track on the topic "No Publications, No Problem! How to Write a Paper and Get Involved in Psychiatry Research as a Trainee," which was co-written by Maravet Baig-Ward, M.D., Ph.D. (not pictured).

Our residents Thomas Pak, M.D., Ph.D., and Tope Adedolapo, M.D., M.S., M.B.A., were among the standing room only attendees.

Our department was superbly represented at the NAMIWalks North Texas event on May 17. In addition to walking and interacting with many members of the community, we hosted a booth about our interventional psychiatry program. Joseph Guillory, M.D., Psychiatry Team Captain and President of NAMI North Texas, presented to the assembled participants about the NAMI mission.

The Multispecialty Psychiatry Clinic Therapy Team completed a team-building/strength-building seminar.

The UT Southwestern Forensic Psychiatry Fellowship, directed by Kehinde Obikoya, M.D., held its annual mock trial on May 1. Justice Nancy Kennedy presided over a mock medical malpractice suit following a death by suicide, with attorneys Alina Caratas and Elena Hartnett from the Dallas County District Attorney's Office representing the plaintiff and the defense for the hospital along with fellows from psychiatry and psychology working the case with faculty member participants for each side.

At the 2025 Dewitt C. Alfred, MD Psychiatric Symposium at Morehouse School of Medicine, Temitope Adedolapo, M.D., M.S., M.B.A., presented on the department's Strategic Planning Group for addressing trainee's ACGME feedback for which Dr. Adedolapo received a Participation Award.

Kapila Marambage, M.D., and Olabisi Adams, LCSW, Paths to Recovery Clinic Manager, presented the poster "The Paths to Recovery Bridge Clinic at Parkland Improving Access to Care through Quality Improvement" (coauthors Minnie Mathew, Benjamin Kum, D.O.) at UT Southwestern's annual Celebration of Excellence event.

Psychiatry resident Donald Egan, M.D., presented “Intentional Storytelling in your Medical School Application” to the American Psychiatric Association’s Future Leaders in Psychiatry Program (FLIPP). Dr. Egan also updated the APA's patient and family page on PTSD: What Is Posttraumatic Stress Disorder? 

Carmen Cruz, Psy.D., participated in a panel for the American Psychological Association’s Division on the Society for the Psychology of Women, titled "Thriving and Liberation with Mid-Career Psychologists." The panelists engaged in conversations about their experiences, dilemmas, successes, and choices they have made to live their intersectional feminist values in mid-career.

Wellness Retreat for Faculty and APPs

Friday, June 6, 8:00am to 5:00pm (Breakfast starts at 7:30), at Pegasus Park

(3000 Pegasus Park Dr, Dallas)

CME-certified! Focus on personal resilience, rejuvenating, and reconnecting with your passion for academic medicine alongside like-minded colleagues.