Research: Mathematical modelling in psychiatry

Are the sufferings of the unwell brain reflections of computations which are unhelpful to the patient? Yes! That's what our new field of computational psychiatry works on ( Click here for a review ). In this new field, I am one of the few researchers who is also a specialist doctor in psychological therapies, i.e. a medical psychotherapist. Computational psychiatry has a great deal to offer to the psychotherapies, as I have enthusiastically advocated here.

I work the Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging, using mathematical models of how the brain processes information. This work emphasizes decision-making, its individual variation, development and aberrations in psychiatric disorder. I use advanced techniques from reinforcement learning, Bayesian probability theory, neuroimaging and other emerging areas. I have a background in mathematically informed sciences as well as psychiatry, which greatly help me in this work. I have published both within the framework of value-based reinforcement learning, under the aegis of prof. Peter Dayan, and also within the framework of free-energy minimization, pioneered by prof. Karl Friston. In recent years I have played a key role in the large-scale study of decision-making in young people, with the team of prof. Raymond Dolan (within the Neuroscience in Psychiatry Network)

Clinical: medical psychotherapy

Being entrusted with patients' problems the greatest priviledge and responsibility of psychiatrists. Many people don't know what we medical psychotherapists are, so let me explain. We have a general psychiatric training. We have experience treating, managing, being with patients suffering from the most serious mental illnesses, and we have been trained in diagnosis and medical (psychiatric) management. Nevertheless, we focus on psychological therapies, and in that we are closer to clinical psychologists than neurologists. We focus on the great abilities of the brain to learn and change so as to recover from mental illness and we take very, very seriously the sense that patients make of the world.

In the Neuropsychiatry department of the National Hospital for Neurology and Neurosurgery, I have been running a psychoeducational / cognitive-behavioural program for people with so-called 'Functional Neurological Symptoms' (FNS). These are medical symptoms that are not explained by diseases that strike the brain, such as stroke or multiple sclerosis, or indeed psychiatric illnesses like bipolar or obsessive-compulsive disorder. Psychotherapy can be very useful in FNS, as long as we keep in mind that these conditions have biological, psychological and even social sides to them. If you are interested in FNS get in touch with me and/or read more about these disorders here.

My other clinical interests are: Serious difficulties in relating to oneself and other people (such as 'personality disorder'); and suffering due to feeling under serious threat (including 'paranoia').

As a medical psychotherapist, I am on the specialist register of the UK General Medical Council and I am a member of the United Kindgom Council for Psychotherapy. Please see my CV for more details.