Experts Join to Launch Cincinnati Mood Disorders Consortium

CINCINNATI—Experts in mood disorders from the University of Cincinnati (UC) College of Medicine, Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center and the Lindner Center of HOPE have joined to launch the Cincinnati Mood Disorders Consortium (CMDC).

"Our mission is to improve the lives of people with mood disorders through improved coordination of key clinical care components, research and education,” says Stephen Strakowski, MD, Dr. Stanley and Mickey Kaplan Professor and Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at UC. "Mood disorders are immensely disabling and disrupt every facet of a person’s life, including physical health.”

The launch event was held Friday, April 29, in the CARE/Crawley Building’s Dr. Stanley and Mickey Kaplan Reception Hall on the UC medical campus. Speakers included Strakowski; Cincinnati City Council Member Chris Bortz; Santa Ono, PhD, UC senior vice president for academic affairs and provost; James Kingsbury, president and CEO, UC Health; and Thomas Boat, MD, executive associate dean, UC College of Medicine, and CEO, University of Cincinnati Physicians.

"This is an exciting day,” Boat said. "The No. 1 challenge in American medicine is not heart disease; it is not cancer; it's not even obesity. It’s mental health disorders.”

Strakowski pointed out that there are 21 million Americans with mood disorders, which include depression and bipolar disorder, and that about $83 billion is spent annually in the United States managing mood disorder.

"These are major medical issues that our country has failed to address,” he said.

In the Greater Cincinnati region, Strakowski said, an estimated 140,000 people have mood disorders, with only one-third to one-half of them receiving treatment. "And these are very treatable conditions,” he added.

The CMDC is a partnership of experts from the UC Neuroscience Institute, UC’s family and community medicine department, Cincinnati Children’s and the Lindner Center of HOPE, which is affiliated with the UC College of Medicine and provides care for individuals with mental illness.

Paul Keck Jr., MD, president and CEO of the Lindner Center of HOPE, is a member of the CMDC Governing Board along with Strakowski, who serves as chairman. Other members of the board are Michael Sorter, MD, director of the division of child and adolescent psychiatry at Cincinnati Children’s; Christopher White, MD, assistant professor of psychiatry and family medicine; Anya Sanchez, MD, administrative director of the UC Neuroscience Institute; and Michael Cerullo, MD, and Scott Ries, both of the department of psychiatry and behavioral neuroscience. Ries serves as CMDC administrative director.