By Badr Ratnakaran, MBBS
PSV President-Elect
Assistant Professor and Geriatric Psychiatrist
Medical Director of CONNECT
Carilion Clinic – VTC-SOM
It is a great privilege and honor to invite you to the 2024 Spring Meeting of the Psychiatric Society of Virginia to be held March 1-2, 2024, at the Sheraton Virginia Beach Oceanfront Hotel in Virginia Beach. Our meeting theme will be “Psychiatry at the Crossroads: The Future and Challenges in Mental Health Treatment Across Lifespan.” We have selected this theme as the field of medicine, including psychiatry, is progressing at a fast pace, with newer treatments of psychiatric disorders, the expansion of the breadth of our role as psychiatrists, and the challenges that come with it.
We will have our Friday evening reception on March 1, with our members from across Virginia networking with our local legislators. Our legislative advisors will provide us with key updates and an opportunity for us to inquire about advocacy for us and our patients.
On Saturday, March 2, we will have our main scientific session with our keynote speaker, Dr. Robert Trestman, who served as the Chair of the APA Presidential Work Group on Roadmap for the Future of Psychiatry. Dr. Trestman will talk about the important challenges and key steps that we and APA have to take for the progress of our field. Following our keynote speech, Miss Silvana Mazella will discuss harm reduction approaches in treating substance use disorders. This will be followed by two sessions on emergency psychiatry, where Dr. Joran Sequeria and Dr. Katherine Liebesny will talk about assessment and challenges in managing child, adolescent, and adult psychiatry patients in our emergency rooms in Virginia.
After lunch, we will begin our afternoon session with Dr. Hamid Okhravi, who will discuss the newer treatments for Alzheimer’s disease. This will be followed by a session on Critical Care Psychiatry, where Dr. Jordan Rosen will discuss the scope of psychiatrists in managing behavioral problems during and after critical illness. I will then talk about the public health emergency of loneliness in our society and the issues related to it across the lifespan. We will conclude our day with a panel discussion with our speakers.
We look forward to seeing you in Virginia Beach!
