Social Isolation and Loneliness: What Mental Health Professionals Can Do?

Dr. Blazer is the JP Gibbons Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University School of Medicine. He received his MD degree from the University of Tennessee and his MPH and PhD degrees from the University of North Carolina. A former interim chair of Psychiatry and Dean of Medical Education for Duke University School of Medicine, he continues to be active in developing national health policy through the National Academies. He was elected to the Institute of Medicine (now National Academy of Medicine) in 1995 and received the Walsh McDermott Award from the IOM for Lifetime Distinguished Service in 2014. He recently chaired the National Academies Committee on Social Isolation and Loneliness. Dr. Blazer was the recipient of the first Annual Geriatric Psychiatry Research Award and the Distinguished Service Award from the American College of Psychiatrists, the Weinberg Award for geriatric psychiatry and the Oscar Pfister Award for the integration of religion and psychiatry from the American Psychiatric Association, the Klemeier Award from the Gerontological Society of America, Rema Lapouse Award from the American Public Health Association, the Distinguished Faculty Award from Duke University School of Medicine and the Distinguished Alumni Award from the University of North Carolina School of Public Health and the University of Tennessee School of Medicine, and the Senior Investigator Award from the American Association of Geriatric Psychiatry.