APA Hires Medical Editor For Practice Guidelines

APA has hired Laura Fochtmann, M.D., an associate professor of psychiatry and of pharmacological sciences at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, to fill the newly created position of medical editor for its practice guidelines program.

As the medical editor, which is a half-time position, Fochtmann will play a major role in coordinating the development of future practice guidelines in the popular series and in revising existing guidelines.

Fochtmann, who began her new duties on July 2, told Psychiatric News that two major components of her job will be to work with the APA Steering Committee on Practice Guidelines, chaired by John McIntyre, M.D., in the selection of topics to add to the guideline series and with the expert work groups that develop and revise each of the practice guidelines.

She added that her collaboration with the expert work groups will involve participating in the extensive literature reviews that form the basis for developing the guidelines, in assessments of the importance of specific topic areas, and in discussions of the quality of the evidence on each topic being evaluated. “I will also work on integrating and processing the comments and reviews that come from the many experts not on the work groups to whom drafts of the guidelines are circulated,” Fochtmann said.

“In addition, I will help ensure that there is a consistent writing style for each section of a practice guideline,” she said.

In her new APA role Fochtmann will report to Lloyd Sederer, M.D., director of the Division of Clinical Services, who oversees all phases of the practice guideline project.

Fochtmann received her undergraduate degree in electrical engineering with a concentration in biomedical engineering before attending medical school at Washington University in St. Louis. After her psychiatry residency she completed a clinical psychopharmacology fellowship at the National Institute of Mental Health where, she noted, she “gained insight into formal data analysis and integrating research findings with clinical practice,” expertise that should prove valuable in her new APA role. She has also been a representative from the Greater Long Island Psychiatric Society to the APA Assembly and a member of the APA Committee on Electroconvulsive Therapy.

Fochtmann commented that she is “excited about the opportunity to work with members of the work groups, the steering committee, and the uniformly superb APA staff that works on the practice guidelines, and particularly to be able to do something of value for both psychiatrists and patients.”

Following the Board of Trustees’ approval in June of the practice guideline on borderline personality disorder (Psychiatric News, August 3), the next new guideline in the series will be one focusing on suicidal behaviors, with publication targeted for 2003. A revision of the bipolar disorder guideline, originally published in 1994, is also underway and follows revisions of the major depressive and eating disorders guidelines, which were released last year.

APA’s practice guidelines are available on the Internet at www.psych.org by selecting the Clinical Resources site and clicking on Practice Guidelines. ▪