David Rosenberg, M.D., has been appointed Chair of the Wayne State University Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences effective Nov. 1.
"His unparalleled passion for education and the clinical treatment of patients, combined with his staunch interest and participation in collaborations that result in cutting-edge research discoveries, makes Dr. Rosenberg the ideal person to lead the department and shape its future," said School of Medicine Dean Valerie M. Parisi, M.D., M.P.H., M.BA., in announcing the appointment. "His extensive collaborations across the campus, with the Merrill Palmer Skillman Institute for Child and Family Development, the Department of Psychology and the Department of Pediatrics, and with researchers at universities and hospitals across North America, have demonstrated how crucial cross-disciplinary research is and will become as we move into the future."
The Miriam L. Hamburger Endowed Chair of Child Psychiatry and professor of Psychiatry, Dr. Rosenberg is a 15-year veteran of the School of Medicine faculty and the department. In addition to his role as psychiatrist-in-chief for the Detroit Medical Center, Dr. Rosenberg also serves as the chief of Child Psychiatry and Psychology for the school of medicine and as director of Child and Adolescent Neuropsychiatric Research at Children's Hospital of Michigan. He is the director of the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Clinical Research Program and the Child and Adolescent Research Division, as well as medical director for Behavioral Health Research and Development for Children's Hospital of Michigan.
"I am honored and humbled to have been selected to lead the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neurosciences as chair," Dr. Rosenberg said. "We have an eclectic department skilled in several domains. We are, therefore, well positioned in this modern era of biological psychiatry with the unique infrastructure at Wayne State University to make important research, education and clinical contributions that will benefit the patients and families we serve. We plan to show people that the Department of Psychiatry at Wayne State is where the action is!"
A strongly funded and widely published researcher, Dr. Rosenberg is often sought out by national media as an expert on issues of child psychiatry. He wrote the first ever textbook on pediatric psychopharmacology, "Textbook of Pharmacotherapy for Childhood and Adolescent Psychiatric Disorders," now in its third edition. He is a member of the editorial boards of the Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Psychology Research and Behavior Management, and Biological Psychiatry.
He has received numerous awards, including Best Teacher by WSU medical students performing their third-year psychiatry clerkship, the Dean's Council Award for Leadership and Teaching in Continuing Medical Education, the Faculty Research Excellence Award and the Faculty Teaching Award from the WSU School of Medicine, and the Psychiatric Times Teacher of the Year Award. In 2004, he received the New Program of the Year Award from the Detroit-Wayne County Community Mental Health Agency for providing services for crisis intervention for children and adolescents. He was named by the WSU Board of Governors a Distinguished Faculty Fellow.
The mentor of numerous students and residents, Dr. Rosenberg has been recognized repeatedly as "Outstanding Mentor" by the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry. His protégés have gone on to win many grants, recognitions and awards of their own.
In addition to integrating clinical care, education and research, "since they are, in fact, inseparable," Dr. Rosenberg said some of his immediate goals center on collaboration.
"Our department plans to collaborate meaningfully with multiple other departments in the School of Medicine, including but not limited to Neurology, Neurosurgery, Pediatrics, Internal Medicine, Family Medicine, and on the main campus, Psychology, Social Work and Public Health," he said. "We will increase our collaboration with our partners in Michigan (the University of Michigan, Michigan State University and Henry Ford Hospital), which will serve us well, as it has in the North Carolina corridor with Duke University and the University of North Carolina). When we partner and complement each other's strengths here in Michigan, we have a pretty formidable team in terms of applying for funding for various research and educational opportunities.
"We have excellent opportunities for increasing endowment funds, and this is very high priority, to increase endowed chairs and professorships in the Department of Psychiatry," he added.
Dr. Rosenberg has served as president of the Michigan Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and is a member of the Psychiatry and Behavioral Medicine Professionals Credentialing Committee, and the Honor Committee for Mental Illness Research Association. He serves on the Detroit Medical Center Advisory Committee, reviewing appointments and reappointments to the DMC medical and allied health staffs.
He was instrumental in Wayne State University's OCD Clinical Research Program being recognized as among the top 10 treatment centers in the nation in 2011.
Dr. Rosenberg received his medical degree from the University of Michigan in 1988, followed by an internship and residency in general psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic. He completed a fellowship in Child Psychiatry as well as a National Institute of Mental Health research fellowship at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic, and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Department of Psychiatry, respectively.