2024 Alma Dea Morani, MD, Renaissance Woman Award and Lecture

Dr. Weissman is a Professor of Epidemiology in Psychiatry Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University and Co Director of the Division of Translational Epidemiology and Mental Health Equity at New York State Psychiatric Institute (NYSPI). Until 1987, she was a Professor of Psychiatry and Epidemiology at Yale University School of Medicine and Director of the Depression Research Unit. She has been a Visiting Senior Scholar at the National Academy of Medicine, Washington, D.C. She received a Ph.D. in epidemiology from Yale University School of Medicine in 1974.

Her research is on understanding the rates and risks of mood and anxiety disorders using methods of epidemiology, genetics, neuroimaging, and the application of these findings to develop and test empirically based treatments and preventive intervention. She developed the first epidemiologic study of rates of clinically based psychiatric disorders in the US which became a model and is now widely used outside of the US. Her current Interest is in bringing psychiatric epidemiology closer to translational studies in the neurosciences and genetics, and on using electronic health records for research. She directs a 3-generation study of families at high and low risk for depression who have been studied clinically for nearly 40 years and who have participated in genetic and imaging studies. She directed a multi-center study to determine the impact of maternal remission from depression on offspring. She was one of the PIs in a multi-centered study to find biomarkers of response to the treatment of depression. Along with her late husband Gerald Klerman, she developed Interpersonal Psychotherapy, the first evidenced-based treatment for depression that now has been translated into numerous languages.  Her book Interpersonal Psychotherapy: A Global Reach, Oxford Press, May 2024 describes its use in 31 countries including several low-income countries. An international organization includes trainers, educators and researchers from all over the world using and adapting the treatment.

Dr. Weissman has been a consultant to many private and public agencies and is a member of the National Academy of Medicine. She has been the author or a co-author of over 800 scientific articles and chapters, and 11 books. She has been the recipient of numerous grants from National Institute of Mental Health, Brain and Behavior Research Foundation and other private foundations. She has received numerous awards for her research.  Some recent highlights include the following. In April 2009, she was selected by the American College of Epidemiology as 1 of 10 epidemiologists in the United States who has had a major impact on public policy and public health. The summary of her work on depression appears in a special issue of the Annals of Epidemiology, Triumphs in Epidemiology, April 2009. In 2016, she was listed among the 100 most cited researchers. In 2020, she received the Brain and Behavior Pardes Humanitarian Prize. In 2021 she received the research prize from the American Psychiatric Association. In 2022 she received the George N. Thompson Women’s Leadership Award from the Society of Biological Psychiatry. In 2023, she received an award for “Outstanding Contribution to the Understanding of Mood Disorders” from the American College of Psychiatrists. According to Google Scholar Citations her H index in 2023 was 175 and she was rated the 25th most cited female in all fields of science in the US and 34th in the world.

Linda P. Fried, MD, MPH is Dean and DeLamar Professor of Public Health at Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, where she is also Professor of Epidemiology and of Medicine; Senior Vice President, Columbia University Medical Center; and Director, Robert N. Butler Columbia Aging Center. A geriatrician and epidemiologist, Dean Fried is an internationally renowned population scientist, clinician, and leader in medicine and public health. As Dean, since 2008, Dr. Fried has led Columbia Public Health to become the leader in innovation in public health education in the US, starting with a completely transformed MPH curriculum for the 21st Century which has become the accreditation standard. She has built a wide range of programs to address the critical issues of our century that affect the public’s health and require effective prevention and mitigation, from the health effects of climate change to increasing health span for our society of longer lives.

As a scientist, Dr. Fried is the author of over 500 scientific articles and chapters. She has led 3 major lines of scientific investigation:  First, research that has defined frailty in aging as a new medical syndrome, with distinct phenotypic presentation, etiology, and outcomes.  Second, she co-designed and founded a novel community-based public health intervention to prevent frailty and cognitive and functional decline in older adults, embedded in a volunteer program for older adults to build social capital, serving in public elementary schools to improve the academic outcomes of the children. This program, Experience Corps, is now in 24 US cities, led by AARP. The third line of work has been to develop the concept that longer lives could lead to a Third Demographic Dividend in which all age groups could flourish due to longevity.

Prior to becoming Dean, Dr. Fried was Director of the Division of Geriatric Medicine and Gerontology and Founding Director of the Center on Aging and Health (Center of Excellence for Aging Research) at the Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions.  

Dean Fried is the recipient of numerous honors and awards, including the Alma Dea Morani, MD., Renaissance Woman Award from the Women in Medicine Legacy Foundation in 2019. Most recently, she was named by France as Chevalier of the Legion of Honor (2023), and received the 2023 Rall Medal of the National Academy of Medicine.  An elected member of the National Academy of Medicine, she is past President of the Association of American Physicians, and an elected member of the Council on Foreign Relations.