From left: Dennis S. Charney, MD; Nora Volkow, MD; Yasmin Hurd, PhD; Sabina Lim, MD, MPH, Professor of Psychiatry, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and Vice President and Chief of Strategy, Behavioral Health, Mount Sinai Health System; and Eric J. Nestler, MD, PhD.
Luminaries in addiction research, policy, and clinical care, led by keynote speaker Nora Volkow, MD, Director of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), participated in an all-day conference in the fall hosted by the Addiction Institute of Mount Sinai (AIMS) at the New York Academy of Medicine.
“Today is about solutions,” said AIMS Director Yasmin Hurd, PhD, Ward-Coleman Chair of Translational Neuroscience, as she welcomed guests to the “Confronting Addiction: Science, Policy, and Care” conference. “Our objective is to start a dialogue among scientists, policymakers, and clinicians so we can create more opportunities to collaborate on developing more effective treatment strategies, support structures, and policy infrastructure for people and families struggling with addiction.” Dr. Hurd, a world-renowned researcher in the neurobiology of addiction disorders, is also Professor of Psychiatry, Neuroscience, and Pharmacological Sciences at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Her remarks were followed by introductions from Dennis S. Charney, MD, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Dean of the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, and President for Academic Affairs for the Mount Sinai Health System, and Eric J. Nestler, MD, PhD, Nash Family Professor of Neuroscience, Dean for Academic and Scientific Affairs, and Director of The Friedman Brain Institute at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
In her speech, “The Role of Science in Substance Abuse Policy and Care,” Dr. Volkow challenged the audience: “When I first came to Washington, D.C., as Director of NIDA, one of the most frustrating things was my naïve perception that policy would be guided by science—and it’s not.” She asked: “So what do we need to do to make sure it’s not ignored? What can we, as scientists, do to increase the likelihood that our evidence-based findings are implemented into policy?”
The event also included discussions on four key topics: Taking Addiction Policy into the 21st Century; Early Predictors of Addiction; Objective Assessment of Addiction Symptoms and Treatment Outcomes; and New Frontiers in Addiction Treatment.