Skip to main content
CLP 2021 Annual Meeting Main banner
Final Program


Back

Roberto Lewis-Fernandez, MD

Professor of Clin Psychiatry; Director, Cultural Competence Center; Co-Dir, Anxiety Disorders Clinic
Columbia University
Irvington, New York, United States

Roberto Lewis-Fernández MD is Professor of Clinical Psychiatry at Columbia University, Director of the New York State Center of Excellence for Cultural Competence and the Hispanic Treatment Program, and Co-Director of the Anxiety Disorder Clinic, at NYS Psychiatric Institute. His research focuses on developing culturally valid interventions and instruments to enhance patient engagement, reduce misdiagnosis, and help overcome disparities in the care of underserved cultural groups. He also studies how culture affects individuals’ experience of mental disorder and their help-seeking expectations, including how to explore this cultural variation during the psychiatric evaluation. Dr. Lewis-Fernández has been PI or co-Investigator of 25 National Institutes of Health-funded studies focused on enhancing cultural aspects of care for diverse underserved populations. He led the development of the DSM-5 Cultural Formulation Interview, a standardized method for cultural assessment for use in mental health practice and was the principal investigator of its international field trial.

Dr. Lewis-Fernández has published over 210 articles, editorials, commentaries, books, and book chapters on the topic of culture and mental health. He is president of the World Association of Cultural Psychiatry, chair of the Cultural Committee of the Group for the Advancement of Psychiatry, immediate past president of the Society for the Study of Psychiatry and Culture (SSPC), 2nd vice-president of the American Psychopathological Association, and past president of the American Society of Hispanic Psychiatry. He chairs the DSM Review Committee for Internalizing Disorders and the DSM-5-TR Culture-Related Issues Committee, and co-chairs the ICD-11 Working Group on Culture-Related Issues.

Vistagen Therapeutics (Other Financial or Material Support, Minor stockholder)

Presentation(s):