Eric Wexler, M.D., Ph.D.

Biography

Dr. Wexler is a recognized expert in psychopharmacology and neuropsychiatry who accepts the most challenging cases of altered mood, impulse control, and cognition. For the past two decades he has specialized in caring for the most treatment-resistant patients suffering from bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and ADHD. He is the founder of Lucidity Behavioral Health and currently serves as medical director of California OnTrack, an intensive coordinated specialty care program for adolescents and adults experiencing either first-episode or chronic psychosis.

Early in his academic career he graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Vassar College with a degree in biochemistry. During medical school at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine he undertook research into nerve cell development and neurotransmitter function, for which he was awarded both a medical degree (M.D.) and a doctorate in neurobiology (Ph.D.). He next completed his residency in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University. He received his primary psychotherapy training with Dr. David Burns, best-selling author and an early popularizer of cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), and with C. Barr Taylor, author of the APA textbook on evidence-based psychiatry.

He then pursued specialized fellowship training in psychopharmacology and neuronal regeneration at Stanford under the auspices of Dr. Alan Schatzberg, former American Psychiatric Association president and coauthor of the official APA textbook of psychopharmacology. During this period he also served as an attending physician in the emergency department of San Francisco General Hospital/UCSF. He later completed a research fellowship in neurobehavioral genetics at UCLA before joining the full-time academic faculty at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine, in the division of geriatric psychiatry and the center for neurobehavioral genetics. Dr. Wexler subsequently entered private practice and later served as medical director for Resilience Treatment Centers prior to founding Lucidity.

Prior to entering private practice, Dr. Wexler, a board-certified psychiatrist and qualified medical examiner, was engaged in both clinical care and basic science research at the UCLA School of Medicine. There his clinical activities included an outpatient clinic emphasizing mood and impulse control disorders, psychiatric consultation for patients with rare inherited or autoimmune forms of neurodegeneration (including patients of the UCLA Huntington's Disease Center of Excellence), and attending on the inpatient geriatric psychiatry unit at the UCLA-Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital.

Complementing these clinical efforts, his research agenda focused on understanding the molecular mechanisms underlying the effectiveness of common mood stabilizers such as lithium; developing novel experimental models of neuropsychiatric disease (e.g. dementia or autism), primarily using human neural stem cells; and developing and applying novel network ("big data") analytic methods to the problem of understanding the signals that govern early nerve cell development and how these contribute to brain dysfunction. In addition, he has provided discreet consultation services to individuals and organizations in the television, print media, legal, and investment banking communities, including work as a technical expert on bipolar disorder and psychosis for Homeland (Fox) and Dexter (Showtime), a clinical consultant to Cochrane Reviews in the psychopharmacology of bipolar affective disorder, and a consulting expert on international treatment guidelines for Huntington's disease.