I saw many UCSF’ers at the American Psychiatric Association Annual Meeting in Philadelphia May 5-9, plus many of our department chair candidates. My own involvement with APA currently is as member of the Practice Guidelines for psychiatric evaluation. We are using a very different approach to develop these. While ‘expert opinion’ is still part of the process, APA has embraced IOM standards for developing clinical practice guidelines, as well as processes such as the GRADE system for rating quality of evidence, and specifying strength of recommendations in the guidelines (high/moderate/low for evidence quality, and strong/weak/none for listed clinical interventions). Also markedly different is that there are nearly as many medical informatics and technology experts as clinicians involved. The guidelines will be modular to help answer a clinician’s specific question on the fly, instead of the previous “comprehensive monograph” format.

Congratulations to SFGH faculty who were officially searched and offered positions through academic search processes effective 4/1/2012, and thank you to the many faculty, staff and applicants’ supporters who were involved in the search process:

• Elida Bautista
• Peter Ferren
• Laurie Fields
• Anne Fleming
• Laurie Richer
• Lydia Santiago
• Sharon Smart

Mission Bay bound: Allison Doupe and Vikaas Sohal move to the new Neuroscience Building at Mission Bay this month, joining our four other faculty in other buildings on site: Ben Cheyette, John Rubenstein, Larry Tecott and Mark von Zastrow.

Akinola, M. & Mendes, W. B. (2012). Stress-induced cortisol facilitates threat-related decision making among police officers. Behavioral Neuroscience, 126, 167-174.

Cushman, F., Gray, K., Gaffey, A., & Mendes, W. B. (2012). Simulating murder: The aversion to harming others. Emotion, 12, 2 - 7.

Gee, S., Ellwood, I., Patel, T., Luongo, F., Deisseroth, K., & Sohal, V. S. (2012). Synaptic activity unmasks dopamine D2 receptor modulation of a specific class of layer V pyramidal neurons in prefrontal cortex. Journal of Neuroscience, 32(14), 4959-4971.

Haller, E. (2012). Marriage plans interrupted and then fulfilled: The impact on a family. Journal of Gay & Lesbian Mental Health, 16, 154–161.

Jamieson, J. P., Koslov, K., Nock, M. K., & Mendes, W. B. (in press). Experiencing discrimination increases risk-taking. Psychological Science.

Jamieson, J. P., Nock, M. K., & Mendes, W. B. (in press). Mind over matter: Reappraising arousal improves cardiovascular and cognitive responses to stress. Journal of Experimental Psychology.

Kubzansky, L. D., Mendes, W. B., Appelton, A., Block, J., & Adler, G. K. (in press). A heartfelt response: Oxytocin and social stress. Biological Psychology.

Maguen, S., Metzler, T. J.,Bosch, J., Marmar, C. R., Knight, S. J., & Neylan, T. C. (2012). Killing in combat may be independently associated with suicidal ideation. Depression and Anxiety, 2012 April 13. [Epub ahead of print]

Major, B., Mendes, W. B., & Dovidio, J. (in press). Intergroup relations and health disparities: A social psychological perspective. Health Psychology.

Mendes, W. B. & Jamieson, J. (2012). Embodied stereotype threat: Exploring brain and body mechanisms underlying performance impairments (pp. 51-68). In: M. Inzlicht & T. Schmader (Eds.). Stereotype threat: Theory, process, and application. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Prochaska, J. J. & Hilton, J.F. (2012). Risk of cardiovascular serious adverse events associated with varenicline use for tobacco cessation: systematic review and meta-analysis. British Medical Journal, 344, e2856.

• On May 4th, Judith J. Prochaska, PhD, MPH and Joan F. Hilton, ScD, MPH published a meta-analysis in the British Medical Journal that examined cardiovascular serious adverse events associated with varenicline use. In contrast to a meta-analysis published by Singh et al. last summer, the UCSF team found no clinically or statistically significant effect in serious cardiovascular events associated with using varenicline. The study was covered on the front page of the SF Chronicle, by Reuters, and a wide number of online news media outlets.

Ramo, D. E., & Prochaska, J. J. (in press). Broad reach and targeted recruitment using Facebook for an online survey of young adult substance use. Journal of Medical Internet Research.

Ramo, D. E., & Prochaska, J. J. (in press). Prevalence and co-use of marijuana among young adult smokers: An anonymous online national survey. Addiction Science & Clinical Practice.

Sawyer, P., Major, B., Casad, B. J., Townsend, S., & Mendes, W. B. (in press). Discrimination and the stress response: Psychological and physiological consequences of anticipating prejudice in interracial interaction. American Journal of Public Health.

Schmader, T., Croft, A., Lickel, B., & Mendes, W. B. (in press). Not in mixed company: Emotional reactions to observed prejudice. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations. Available on-line ahead of print.

Sohal, V. S. (2012). Insights into cortical oscillations arising from optogenetic studies. Biological Psychiatry. 2012 Feb 28. [Epub ahead of print]