APA Announces Slate of Candidates for 2021 Election

The slate of psychiatrists chosen to compete for officer and trustee positions on APA’s Board of Trustees in the 2021 election is made up of experienced psychiatrists who have made their mark in the field and have a wide range of backgrounds.

The candidates for president-elect are Rebecca W. Brendel, M.D., J.D., and Jacqueline Maus Feldman, M.D.

Brendel is associate director of the Harvard Medical School Center for Bioethics and a practicing psychiatrist at Massachusetts General Hospital. A Distinguished Fellow of APA with a career of service in psychiatry and medicine, she is chair of the APA Committee on Ethics and a member of the AMA’s Council on Ethical and Judicial Affairs. She is a past president of the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry.

Feldman is Professor Emerita at the University of Alabama at Birmingham, where she served as vice chair for clinical services and medical director of the psychiatric hospital. Now NAMI associate medical director, she’s an APA Distinguished Life Fellow and provided leadership in APA (APAF Board member and chair of Scientific Program Committees and presidential IPS Work Group) and was president of the American Association for Community Psychiatry.

The position of secretary, which has a two-year term, is up for election in this cycle. Vying for the post are Rahn K. Bailey, M.D., of Los Angeles and Sandra M. DeJong, M.D., M.Sc., of Cambridge, Mass.

Facing off in the race for early career psychiatrist (ECP) trustee are Elie Aoun, M.D., of New York City; Tanuja Gandhi, M.D., of Riverside, R.I.; Abhisek Chandan Khandai, M.D., M.S., of Chicago; and Lan Chi Le Vo, M.D., of Philadelphia.

For minority/underrepresented representative (M/UR) trustee, the candidates are Oscar E. Perez, M.D., of El Paso, Texas, and Felix Torres, M.D., M.B.A., of Temple, Texas.

The ECP trustee term is three years; the M/UR trustee term is two.

Three of APA’s seven geographic Areas will vote for a trustee in this cycle. Only members within each Area may vote for their respective Area trustee. Area trustees hold three-year terms.

In the race for Area 1 trustee are Eric M. Plakun, M.D., of Stockbridge, Mass., and Maureen Sayres Van Niel, M.D., of Waban, Mass.

Competing for Area 7 trustee are Annette M. Matthews, M.D., of Portland, Ore., and Mary Hasbah Roessel, M.D., of Santa Fe, N.M.

The candidates for Area 4 trustee will be announced at a later date.

The candidates for resident-fellow member (RFM) trustee-elect are Souparno Mitra, M.D., a PGY-2 psychiatry resident at Bronx Care Health Systems in the Bronx, N.Y.; Lindsay M. Poplinski, D.O., a PGY-2 psychiatry resident at OhioHealth Riverside Methodist Hospital in Columbus, Ohio; and Urooj Yazdani, M.D., a PGY-3 psychiatry resident at the University of Louisville School of Medicine in Louisville, Ky. The individual who wins the RFM trustee-elect race will serve for a year in the trustee-elect position and then rotate the following year into the RFM trustee position.

The nominations were put forth by APA’s Nominating Committee, chaired by Immediate Past President Bruce Schwartz, M.D., and announced last month. The slate is considered official and was approved by APA’s Board of Trustees. The winning candidates will take office at the close of APA’s 2021 Annual Meeting in May.

All members for whom APA has a valid email address on file will receive an electronic ballot. Other members will receive a paper ballot along with instructions on how to vote online. All candidates as well as their supporters are strongly urged to review APA’s Election Guidelines.

Voting will begin on January 4, 2021, and end on February 1 at 12:59 p.m. ET. Candidates’ photos and the addresses of their personal websites will be published in the December 18 issue of Psychiatric News. ■