Dr. Raymond Lam, M.D.

Dr. Raymond W. Lam was born and raised in Vancouver where he completed his medical degree in 1981 at the University of British Columbia. Following a rotating internship at the Jewish General Hospital/McGill University in Montreal, he completed residency training in psychiatry at the University of BC, and a postgraduate research fellowship in the Psychobiology of Mood Disorders at the University of California, San Diego.

Since 1988, Dr. Lam has been on faculty in the Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, University of BC, where he is now a Professor of Psychiatry and Head of the Division of Clinical Neuroscience. He is also Medical Director of the Mood Disorders Centre at UBC Hospital. His research and clinical interests are in the areas of seasonal, atypical, chronic and resistant depression, clinical psychopharmacology, light therapy, seasonality of psychiatric disorders, serotonin and catecholamine mechanisms in depression, circadian rhythm disturbances, and population-based treatment programs for depression.

Dr. Lam has authored over 170 scientific articles and book chapters, and has edited 2 books, Seasonal Affective Disorder and Beyond: Light Treatment for SAD and non-SAD Conditions (American Psychiatric Press, Inc., 1998) and Canadian Consensus Guidelines for the Treatment of SAD (Clinical & Academic Publishing, 1999). Dr. Lam has received many peer-reviewed and industry research grants from the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, the Canadian Psychiatric Research Foundation, the BC Health Research Foundation, and others. He reviews for several scientific journals and granting agencies, and sits on the Editorial Boards for the Canadian Journal of Psychiatry and Visions: BC’s Mental Health Journal, published by the Canadian Mental Health Association.

In 2001, Dr. Lam was the inaugural annual recipient of the Douglas Utting Prize and Medal for Depression Research (McGill University), for his significant contribution to the understanding of depression and its treatment. He also received the Clinical Investigator Award (UBC Brain Research Centre, 1999) for his clinical research. Dr. Lam is a founding member and Executive Chair of the Canadian Network for Mood and Anxiety Treatments (CANMAT). He has also served in executive positions for international scientific societies. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and a Foundation Fellow of the International Society for Affective Disorders (ISAD). Dr. Lam has spearheaded national clinical practice guidelines for the diagnosis and pharmacological treatment of depressive disorders, and for the treatment of seasonal affective disorder.

Dr. Lam is a leader in medical education. He co-chaired the Brain and Behaviour block in the case-based learning curriculum of the UBC medical school. His teaching excellence was recognized with the Nancy A. Roeske Award for Excellence in Medical Student Education (American Psychiatric Association, 1998). He also supervises postgraduate students and residents in psychiatry, and lectures extensively to professional audiences. Dr. Lam is active in public education initiatives on mood disorders and sits on the Scientific Advisory Board of DIRECT, the Depression Information Resource and Education Centre, Toll-free, funded by the Province of Ontario. Dr. Lam received the Special Recognition Award (Canadian Mental Health Association, 1998) for his public and community education efforts.