Certificate in
Psychedelic-Assisted Therapies (CPAT)

Dr Gita Vaid (USA)

MD

Gita Vaid MD is CPAT’s International Course Director.

She is a Board Certified Psychiatrist and psychoanalyst practicing in New York City. Dr Vaid completed her residency training at NYU Medical Center and her psychoanalytic training at the Institute for Psychoanalytic Education affiliated with NYU. Her early biological and research background includes a completed fellowship in clinical psychopharmacology and neurophysiology at New York Medical College and a research fellowship at NYU Medical Center.

Dr Vaid is currently on faculty and teaches at both IPE and the NYU department of Psychiatry. She has a special interest in teaching interview technique, psychoanalytic theory and British object relations.

Dr Vaid’s current focus and expertise are in psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. She is a MAPS trained psychedelic therapist and was part of the NY site Phase 3 MDMA psychotherapy study for PTSD.

Dr Vaid is a leader in ketamine assisted psychotherapy which she practices and teaches in New York City.  She serves as a lead instructor at The Ketamine Training Center with psychedelic psychotherapy pioneer, Dr. Phil Wolfson. She is a co-founder of the Center for Natural Intelligence, a multidisciplinary laboratory dedicated to psychedelic psychotherapy innovation and research. She serves as the Director of Psychedelic Awareness and Consciousness research at The Chopra Foundation and with Dr. Deepak Chopra is currently developing protocols integrating meditation with ketamine assisted psychotherapy.

Current publications include:

Vaid G, Walker B. “Psychedelic Psychotherapy: Building Wholeness Through Connection”. Glob Adv Health Med. 2022 Feb 23;11

Gita Vaid, MD, “Psychoanalysis and Psychedelic Psychotherapy : A New Modern Synthesis?” The Wounds of Our Mother Psychoanalysis – New Models for a Psychoanalysis in Crisis.

Dr Eli Kotler (AUS)

MBBS MPM FRANZCP Cert. Old Age Psych. AFRACMA

Eli Kotler is CPAT’s Australian Course Director.

He is a Consultant Psychiatrist and Psychodynamic Psychotherapist. He is the Medical Director of Malvern Private Hospital, an addiction and trauma hospital in Melbourne. Eli completed the inaugural Mind Medicine Australia Certificate in Psychedelic-Assisted Therapies (CPAT) course, and has since been on its Faculty.

As a psychiatric trainee, Eli was awarded the Royal College of Psychiatrists Trainee Prize for his Scholarly Project on Depression, as well as a Research Committee Trainee award for his work on Philosophy of Mind. As an adjunct lecturer at Monash University, he oversees medical students on their addiction medicine rotation. He has been invited as a keynote speaker to several conferences and meetings to discuss addictions, trauma and psychedelics. Eli sits on the Committee of the ANZMHA to help organise their yearly addiction conference. He also sits on the inaugural Clinical Advisory Group for the Victorian Responsible Gambling Foundation. Eli is an Associate Fellow of the Royal Australasian College of Medical Administrators, and is a member of the Australasian Professional Society on Alcohol and other Drugs. He also has extensive research experience with novel therapeutics for neurodegenerative diseases.

Due to his interest in trauma, Eli has been appointed an Independent Medical Examiner by WorkSafe Victoria. He has been appointed by the Minister for Workplace Safety to sit on the Victorian Medical Panels, and is an expert witness in historical abuse cases.

Clinically, Eli works in a psychodynamic framework, and attempts to help his patients find freedom from their addictions and trauma through relational experiences, and experiential self-awareness. He is part of the AFL Player’s Association referral network for addiction issues, and his interests in depth-psychology and neuroscience led him to found the Melbourne Neuropsychoanalytic Group.  Eli is a Board Director of Mind Medicine Australia.

Professor Arthur Christopoulos (AUS)

BPharm, PH.D, FAA, FAHMS

Arthur Christopoulos is Professor of Analytical Pharmacology, Dean of the Faculty of Pharmacy & Pharmaceutical Sciences, and Director of the Neuromedicines Discovery Centre, Monash University, Parkville, Australia. Prior to his appointment as Dean, he was a Senior Principal Research Fellow of the NHMRC. His work focuses on novel paradigms of drug action at G protein-coupled receptors, the largest drug-target class for current medicines, and has been applied to fundamental and translational studies encompassing neurological and psychiatric disorders, cardiovascular disease, obesity, diabetes and chronic pain.

Professor Christopoulos has over 340 publications, including in leading journals such as Nature, Science and Cell. He has also been the recipient of multiple major national and international awards. Since 2014-present, Clarivate Analytics have named him a Highly Cited Researcher in Pharmacology and Toxicology, and in 2021 also named him a Highly Cited Researcher in Biology & Biochemistry. In 2017, he was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Health and Medical Sciences and in 2021 was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science.

Dr Wade Davis CM (Canada)

PH.D

Wade Davis is a writer and photographer whose work has taken him from the Amazon to Tibet, Africa to Australia, Polynesia to the Arctic. Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society from 2000 to 2013, he is currently Professor of Anthropology and the BC Leadership Chair in Cultures and Ecosystems at Risk at the University of British Columbia.

Wade has authored 22 books, including One River, The Wayfinders and Into the Silence, he holds degrees in anthropology and biology and received his Ph.D. in ethnobotany, all from Harvard University. In 2016, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada. In 2018 he became an Honorary Citizen of Colombia.

Dr Rick Doblin (USA)

BSc, PH.D

Rick Doblin, Ph.D., is the founder and executive director of the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). He received his doctorate in Public Policy from Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government, where he wrote his dissertation on the regulation of the medical uses of psychedelics and marijuana and his Master’s thesis on a survey of oncologists about smoked marijuana vs. the oral THC pill in nausea control for cancer patients. His undergraduate thesis at New College of Florida was a 25-year follow-up to the classic Good Friday Experiment, which evaluated the potential of psychedelic drugs to catalyze religious experiences. He also conducted a thirty-four year follow-up study to Timothy Leary’s Concord Prison Experiment. Rick studied with Dr Stanislav Grof and was among the first to be certified as a Holotropic Breathwork practitioner. His professional goal is to help develop legal contexts for the beneficial uses of psychedelics and marijuana, primarily as prescription medicines but also for personal growth for otherwise healthy people, and eventually to become a legally licensed psychedelic therapist. He founded MAPS in 1986, and currently resides in Boston with his wife and empty rooms from three children who are all in college or recently graduated.

Dr James Fadiman (USA)

BA, Ph.D

James Fadiman B.A. (Harvard) M.A., Ph.D. (Stanford) began his  personal psychedelic research a few weeks before starting his graduate work at Stanford where he did his dissertation on the effectiveness of LSD-assisted therapy.  During the research lull of 40 years, he has held a variety of teaching (San Francisco State, Brandeis, and Stanford) consulting, training, counseling and editorial positions. He has taught in psychology departments, design engineering, and for three decades, at the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology (now Sofia University) that he co-founded.

He has published textbooks, professional books, a self-help book, a novel, and a series of videos, Drugs: the children are choosing for National Public Television. His books have been published in 8 languages. He has been the subject of a one-hour documentary released by Page3 Films, featured in a National Geographic documentary and had three solo shows of his nature photography.

He had his own consulting firm and sat on two non-profit boards as well as having been the president of several small natural resource companies. He has been involved in researching psychedelic for spiritual, therapeutic and creative uses and is known for his pioneering work on microdosing .  He has published The Psychedelic Explorer’s Guide: Safe, Therapeutic, and Sacred Journeys, and most recently, Your Symphony of Selves: Discover and Understand More of Who You Are

Dr Albert Garcia-Romeu (USA)

PH.D

Albert Garcia-Romeu, Ph.D. is a member of the Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences faculty at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and a Guest Researcher at the National Institute on Drug Abuse Intramural Research Program. His research examines the effects of psychedelics in humans, with a focus on psilocybin as an aid in the treatment of addiction. He received his doctorate in Psychology in 2012 from the Institute of Transpersonal Psychology in Palo Alto, CA, where he studied self-transcendence and meditation, and their relationship to mental health. His current research interests include clinical applications of psychedelics, mindfulness, and altered states of consciousness and their underlying psychological mechanisms. He additionally studies real-world drug use patterns and impacts on public health, and the role of spirituality in mental health and addiction. He is a founding member of the Johns Hopkins Center for Psychedelic and Consciousness Research and the International Society for Research on Psychedelics.

Dr Ingmar Gorman (USA)

PH.D

Dr Ingmar Gorman is the co-founder of Fluence, a psychedelic education company training mental health providers in psychedelic treatments. He is a psychologist specializing in helping people who use psychedelics and other psychoactive compounds. He received his clinical training at the New School for Social Research, Mount Sinai Beth Israel Hospital, Columbia University, and Bellevue Hospital. He completed his NIH postdoctoral fellowship at New York University in 2017. Dr Gorman was formerly the Director of the Psychedelic Education and Continuing Care Program, formerly site co-principal investigator and current active therapist on a Phase 3 clinical trial of MDMA-assisted Psychotherapy for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and active therapist on a Phase 2 clinical trial of Psilocybin-assisted Psychotherapy for Treatment Resistant Depression.

Dr Lauren Macdonald (UK)

Bsc, MD

Lauren Macdonald is a psychiatry doctor, group facilitator and co-founder of Essence Medicine, an organisation providing psycho-spiritual care to people facing life threatening illness. As a clinical trial doctor and therapist at the Centre for Psychedelic Research, Imperial College London, she works across several psychedelic trials, mainly with psilocybin and DMT. Lauren is particularly passionate about weaving psycho-spiritual care, including psychedelic-assisted therapy, into modern healthcare, especially within the palliative care setting. She has degrees in Medicine and Psychology, and has undertaken further certificates in Integrative Medicine, Compassionate Inquiry, Yoga and Psychedelic-Assisted Therapy (Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies). She is a student of ancient wisdom traditions and an advocate for sacred reciprocity.

Dr Gabor Maté CM (Canada)

BA, MD, Doctor of Laws (honoris causa)

Gabor Maté (pronunciation: GAH-bor MAH-tay) is a retired physician who, after 20 years of family practice and palliative care experience, worked for over a decade in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side with patients challenged by drug addiction and mental illness. The bestselling author of four books published in twenty-five languages, Gabor is an internationally renowned speaker highly sought after for his expertise on addiction, trauma, childhood development, and the relationship of stress and illness.

His book on addiction received the Hubert Evans Prize for literary non-fiction. For his groundbreaking medical work and writing he has been awarded the Order of Canada, his country’s highest civilian distinction, and the Civic Merit Award from his hometown, Vancouver. His books include In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction; When the Body Says No; The Cost of Hidden Stress; Scattered Minds: The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder; and (with Gordon Neufeld) Hold on to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers. To learn more, join his enews list at www.drgabormate.com.

Dr David E. Nichols (USA)

BSc, PH.D

David E. Nichols, PhD is an Adjunct Professor of Chemical Biology and Medicinal Chemistry at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.  Previously he held the Robert C. and Charlotte P. Anderson Distinguished Chair in Pharmacology and was a Distinguished Professor of Medicinal Chemistry and Molecular Pharmacology at the Purdue University College of Pharmacy.  He received his B.S. degree in chemistry from the University of Cincinnati in 1969, and the PhD in Medicinal Chemistry from the University of Iowa in 1973, following which he did postdoctoral work in pharmacology at the University of Iowa, College of Medicine.  In 2004 he was named the Irwin H. Page Lecturer by the International Society for Serotonin Research and in 2006 he received the first Provost’s Outstanding Graduate Mentor award from Purdue University.  He has published more than 300 scientific articles, most of which deal with the relationship between molecular structure and biological action.

Professor David Nutt (UK)

BA, MB BChir, MRCP, MA, DM, MRC Psych, FRCPsych, FMedSci, FRCP, FSB

Renowned researcher, policy advisor and author, Professor David Nutt, is currently Head of Neuropsychopharmacology at Imperial College London.

Under the leadership of Professor Nutt, the Psychedelic Research Group at Imperial College is one of the world’s foremost psychedelic research laboratories, publishing landmark research on psychedelic therapies and neuroimaging studies of the psychedelic state.

Professor Nutt has also held many leadership positions in both UK and European academic, scientific and clinical organisations, including presidencies of: the European Brain Council, the British Neuroscience Association, the British Association of Psychopharmacology, the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology.

He was previously Chair of the UK Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs.

Sara Reed (USA)

MS LMFT

Sara Reed is a mental health futurist and Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist. She has spent her early career examining ways culture informs how we diagnose and treat mental illnesses. Sara has participated as a study therapist and participant in psychedelic therapy research and is currently the lead study therapist at Imperial College London for their psilocybin for OCD trial. She lectures on topics fusing culturally sensitive practices within psychedelic-assisted therapy and advises organizations on anti-oppressive and inclusive practices.

Dr William (Bill) Richards (USA)

PH.D

William A. Richards (Bill), a psychologist in the Center for Psychedelic
and Consciousness Research at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, has been implementing research studies with psilocybin since 1999. His graduate degrees
include M.Div. (Yale) , S.T.M. (Andover-Newton) and Ph.D. (Catholic University). He also studied with Abraham Maslow at Brandeis University and with Hanscarl Leuner at Georg-August University in Göttingen, Germany, where his involvement with psilocybin research originated in 1963. From 1967 to 1977, he implemented projects of psychotherapy research with LSD, DPT, MDA and psilocybin at the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center, including protocols designed to investigate the promise of psychedelics in the treatment of alcoholism, depression, narcotic addiction and the psychological distress associated with terminal cancer, and also their use in the training of religious and mental-health professionals. His book, Sacred Knowledge: Psychedelics and Religious Experiences has been released by Columbia University Press.

Dr Ben Sessa (UK)

MBBS, B.SC, MRC PSYCH

Ben Sessa is a consultant child and adolescent psychiatrist who has worked with young people and adults in the field of addictions and trauma-related psychiatry for over 20 years. For the last 15 years Ben has been at the forefront of psychedelic research in the UK through his affiliations with Bristol University and Imperial College London, under the auspices of Professor David Nutt. He has taken part as a study doctor and as a healthy subject both receiving and / or administering MDMA, psilocybin, LSD, DMT and ketamine in multiple UK research  studies. He runs one of the first UK-based medical cannabis prescribing clinics. Ben is the Chief Medical Officer at AWAKN Life Sciences, a new start-up company opening Europe’s first psychedelic medical clinic, which will be providing psychedelic therapies, therapist training courses and conducting independent research. Ben is the co-founder and former president of Europe’s largest psychedelic conference, Breaking Convention.

Licia Sky

Licia Sky is co-founder and CEO of the Trauma Research Foundation. She is also a somatic educator, bodyworker, artist, and musician.  She guides transformational experiences incorporating dynamic observational exercises, music, movement, and touch to foster safe, transformative inner and interpersonal connection. Her methods are informed by over 30 years as an artist, musician, bodywork therapist, yoga practitioner, and dancer, integrating poly-vagal theory, parts work, and the latest research on trauma and the body.

Dr Bessel van der Kolk

MD

Bessel van der Kolk MD, Professor of Psychiatry, Boston University School of Medicine and President, Trauma Research Foundation, has spent his career studying how children and adults adapt to traumatic experiences, and have tried to translate emerging findings from pharmacology, neuroscience and attachment research to develop and study potentially effective treatments for traumatic stress in children and adults.

In 1984 he set up one of the first clinical/research centers in the US dedicated to study and treatment of traumatic stress in civilian populations, which has trained numerous researchers and clinicians specializing in the study and treatment of traumatic stress, and which has been continually funded to research the impact of traumatic stress and effective treatment interventions. He conducted the first studies on the effects of SSRIs on PTSD; he was a member of the first neuroimaging team to investigate how trauma changes brain processes, and he did the first research linking BPD and deliberate self-injury to trauma and neglect in early childhood.

Currently he is Principal Investigator of the Boston arm of the MAPS 1 and 2 studies on the effects of MDMA on people with chronic PTSD. His seminal book The Body keeps the Score , has been on the New York Times best seller list for over 230 weeks, and has been translated into 42 different languages.

Dr Jeremy Weate (Canada)

PH.D

Jeremy Weate has a PhD in philosophy from the University of Warwick. He has over 17 years strategic advisory experience, focused on minister-level guidance on the mining sector across over 50 projects in over 30 countries in Europe, Africa, Central Asia and the South Pacific. Jeremy also has a decade-long interest in the medicalization of ibogaine. In 2018, he helped set up Tabula Rasa Retreat in Portugal, now of the leading ibogaine treatment facilities globally. He has organised ibogaine conferences in Vienna, Porto and London. He is CEO of the Vancouver-based Universal Ibogaine, which will IPO on the Toronto Stock Exchange later this year. Universal Ibogaine will take ibogaine through clinical trials in Canada, with a view to multi-country phase 3 trials in Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Israel. The company will launch holistically minded psychedelic-assisted therapy clinics in North America and subsequently globally this decade under the ClearSky Recovery brand.

Dr Philip Wolfson (USA)

MD

Phil Wolfson MD is Principal Investigator for the MAPS sponsored Phase 2, FDA approved 18-person study of MDMA Assisted Psychotherapy for individuals with significant anxiety due to life threatening illnesses. His clinical practice with ketamine has informed his leadership role in the development of Ketamine Assisted Psychotherapy. Phil’s book The Ketamine Papers has been published by MAPS and is the seminal work in the burgeoning ketamine arena. Phil is a sixties activist, psychiatrist/psychotherapist, writer, practicing Buddhist and psychonaut who has lived in the Bay Area for 38 years. He is the author of Noe – A Father/Son Song of Love, Life, Illness and Death (2011, North Atlantic Books). In the 1980s, he participated in clinical research with MDMA (Ecstasy). He has been awarded five patents for unique herbal medicines. He is a journalist and author of numerous articles on politics, transformation, psychedelics, consciousness and spirit, and was a founding member of the Heffter Research Institute. Phil has taught in the graduate psychology programs at JFK University, CIIS and the UCSF School of Medicine Department of Psychiatry.