In March, Jeffrey M. Lyness, MD, of the University of Rochester Medical Center, will become president of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry (AAGP). Dr. Lyness will succeed Charles F. Reynolds, III, MD, as president of the 1700-member organization at the conclusion of the AAGP’s 23nd annual scientific meeting, to be held March 5-8 in Savannah, Georgia.

As president, Dr. Lyness, a 20-year AAGP member, will direct the association as it focuses on three priority areas to better meet the needs of an increasing number of older adults with mental illness: the health care workforce, collaboration across disciplines, and health care policy. Dr. Lyness explained that workforce initiatives include improving the recruitment and nurturing of early career physicians into the field of geriatric psychiatry. “But it also must include broader efforts to improve the skills of clinicians, teachers, and researchers outside our field in the many aspects of geriatric mental health relevant to their careers,” he explained.

“The vitality of our clinical practice and our research efforts depends on the active interchange across disciplines, including physicians from other specialties and the many other professionals represented in our membership and at our annual meetings,” Dr. Lyness said. “It also increasingly will depend on collaborations across institutions and nations.”

Regarding the public policy work and advocacy that the association has long counted among its priorities, Dr. Lyness commented, “Our science must be marshaled to support changes in health care policy, changes that are desperately required to foster the real-world application of our collective expertise to the patients and families who need us.”

Dr. Lyness is the associate chair for education and professor of psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Rochester Medical Center, as well as the director of the Geriatric Psychiatry Program. He also serves as director of curriculum and medical director for continuing medical education for the University of Rochester medical school. His research activities focus on the relationships between depression and medical illnesses in later life, and have been supported by grants from the National Institute of Mental Health, NARSAD, and industry.

Dr. Lyness received his medical degree with honor and with distinction in research from the University of Rochester, and completed his internship in internal medicine there and his psychiatry residency at Yale University. He completed clinical and research fellowship training in the Geriatric Psychiatry Program at Rochester.

“Jeff Lyness is one of the nation’s most distinguished geriatric psychiatrists, a superb researcher whose work has real world practical value and a great educator. His leadership is a great boon to our field,” said outgoing AAGP President Charles F. Reynolds, III, MD.

Incoming AAGP President Lyness will deliver the keynote address, “When I’m 64”—The Baby Boomers Have Arrived!, at AAGP’s Opening Plenary on Friday, March 5, at 5:00 p.m. at the Westin Savannah Harbor, Grand Ballroom A/B.

Founded in 1978, the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry (www.AAGPonline.org) is a national organization representing and serving its members and the field of geriatric psychiatry. AAGP’s mission is to enhance the knowledge base and standard of practice in geriatric psychiatry through education and research and to advocate for meeting the mental health needs of older Americans.

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Contact: Kate McDuffie, AAGP
301.654.7850 ext. 113; kmcduffie@aagponline.org