Augustus John Rush M.D. (born December 15, 1942) is an internationally renowned psychiatrist. He is a Professor Emeritus in Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School at the National University of Singapore (NUS), and Adjunct Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University School of Medicine. He has authored and edited more than 10 books, and over 600 scientific journal articles that are largely focused on the diagnosis and treatment of depressive and bipolar disorders.
Education and early life
Rush grew up in New Jersey with his younger sister. He graduated valedictorian from the Pingry School, an independent, college preparatory country day school in New Jersey. Rush earned his bachelor's degree in biochemistry, cum laude, from Princeton University in 1964, and his medical degree from the Columbia University College of Physicians & Surgeons in 1968. Following his general medical internship at Passavant Hospital, Northwestern University, Chicago, Illinois, he served as a general medical officer in the U.S. Army in Nuremberg, Germany. Following an additional year of government service in the Special Action Office for Drug Abuse Prevention in Washington, D.C., he completed his psychiatric residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. There, he established the Depression Clinic with Manoochehr Khatami, M D. He collaborated with his mentor Aaron T. Beck M.D. in the specification and initial testing of cognitive therapy for depression.
Career and research
As Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, University of Oklahoma, he led the third year medical student rotation in psychiatry and founded the Depression Clinic. He then joined the Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas as Associate Professor, Professor and subsequently Vice Chair in Psychiatry. He was later also appointed Vice Chair and Professor in the Department of Clinical Sciences at UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas. Subsequently, as Professor and Vice Dean of Clinical Sciences at Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School in Singapore from 2008 to 2013, he established and developed specialized programs to launch and support patient-oriented research careers for clinicians by creating the Academic Medicine Research Institute, and a program in clinical research for third-year medical students.
His research has focused on the development and testing of innovative treatments for depressive and bipolar disorders including medications, medication combinations, somatic treatments, psychotherapy, and disease management protocols. Rush’s work is widely recognized nationally and internationally, and has received awards from many professional organizations including the American College of Psychiatrists, American Psychopathological Association the National Alliance for Research in Schizophrenia and Affective Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association and the Society for Biological Psychiatry, among others. In 2014, Thomson Reuters recognized Dr. Rush as one of the “World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds”.
Rush, A.J., First, M.B., Blacker, D. (Eds.). Handbook of Psychiatric Measures, Second Edition. American Psychiatric Publishing Inc., 2008.Basco, M.R. and Rush, A.J. Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Bipolar Disorder, Second Edition. New York: Guilford Press, 2005; Paperback, 2007; first edition, 1996.Rush, A.J. (Ed.). Mood Disorders: Systematic Medication Management. Modern Problems of Pharmacopsychiatry, Vol. 25. Basel, Switzerland: S. Karger, AG, 1997.Wilkes, T.C.R., Belsher, G., Rush, A.J., Frank, E. and Associates. Cognitive Therapy for Depressed Adolescents. New York: Guilford Press, 1994.Rush, A.J. and Altshuler, K.Z. (Eds.), Depression: Basic Mechanisms, Diagnosis, and Treatment. New York: Guilford Press, 1986.Rush, A. J.Beating Depression. London: Century Publishing Co. Ltd. And New York: Facts on File Inc. 1983Rush, A.J. (Ed.) Short-term Psychotherapies for Depression. New York: Guilford Press, 1982Beck, A.T., Rush, A. J., Shaw, B. F. and Emory, G. Cognitive Therapy of Depression: New York, Guilford. Press, 1979.Selected Articles
Rush, A.J., Trivedi, M.H., Stewart, J.W., Nierenberg, A.A., Fava, M., Kurian, B.T., Warden, D., Morris, D.W., Luther, J.F., Husain, M.M., Cook, I.A., Shelton R.C., Lesser, I.M., Kornstein, S.G., Wisniewski, S.R. Combining Medications to Enhance Depression Outcomes (CO-MED): Acute and long-term outcomes: A single-blind randomized study. American Journal of Psychiatry, 168: 689-701, 2011.Williams, L., Rush, A.J., Koslow, S.H., Wisniewski, S.R., Cooper, N.J., Nemeroff, C.B., Schatzberg, A.F., Gordon, E. International study to predict optimized treatment for depression (iSPOT-D), a randomized clinical trial: Rationale and design. Trials, 12:4, 2011.Rush, A.J., Trivedi, M.H., Ibrahim, H.M., Carmody, T.J., Arnow, B., Klein, D.N., Markowitz, J.C., Ninan, P.T., Kornstein, S., Manber, R., Thase, M.E., Kocsis, J.H. and Keller, M.B. The 16-item Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology (QIDS) Clinician Rating (QIDS-C) and Self-Report (QIDS-SR): A psychometric evaluation in patients with chronic major depression. Biological Psychiatry, 54(5):573-583, 2003.Schatzberg, A.F., Rush, A.J., Arnow, B.A., Banks, P.L., Blalock, J.A., Borian, F.E., Howland, R., Klein, D.N., Kocsis, J.H., Kornstein, S.G., Manber, R., Markowitz, J.C., Miller, I., Ninan, P.T., Rothbaum, B.O., Thase, M.E., Trivedi, M.H., and Keller, M.B. Chronic depression: medication (nefazodone) or psychotherapy (CBASP) is effective when the other is not. Archives of General Psychiatry, 62(5):513-520, 2005.Rush, A.J., Beck, A.T., Kovacs, M. and Hollon, S.D. Comparative efficacy of cognitive therapy and pharmacotherapy in the treatment of depressed outpatients. Cognitive Therapy and Research, 1:17-37, 1977. Reprinted in Annual Review of Behavior Therapy Theory and Practice, C.M. Franks and G.T. Wilson (Eds.), Brunner/Mazel Publications, New York, 1978.Rush, A.J., Crismon, M.L., Kashner, T.M., Toprac, M.G., Carmody, T.J., Trivedi, M.H., Suppes, T., Miller, A.L., Biggs, M.M., Shores-Wilson, K., Witte, B.P., Shon, S.P., Rago, W.V. and Altshuler, K.Z. for the TMAP Research Group. Texas Medication Algorithm Project, Phase 3 (TMAP-3): Rationale and study design. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 64:357-369, 2003.Rush, A.J., Kraemer, H.C., Sackeim, H.A., Fava, M., Trivedi, M.H., Frank, E., Ninan, P.T., Thase, M.E., Gelenberg, A.J., Kupfer, D.J., Regier, D.A., Rosenbaum, J.F., Ray, O. and Schatzberg, A.F. Report by the ACNP Task Force on response and remission in major depressive disorder. Neuropsychopharmacology, 31(9):1842-1853, 2006.Trivedi, M.H., Rush, A.J., Crismon, M.L., Kashner, T.M., Toprac, M.G., Carmody, T.J., Key, T., Biggs, M.M., Shores-Wilson, K., Witte, B., Suppes, T., Miller, A.L., Altshuler, K.Z., and Shon, S.P. Clinical results for patients with major depressive disorder in the Texas Medication Algorithm Project (TMAP). Archives of General Psychiatry, 61(7):669-680, 2004Adli, M., Bauer, M., Rush, A.J. Algorithms and collaborative-care systems for depression: Are they effective and why? A systematic review. Biological Psychiatry, 59(11):1029-1038, 2006.Rush, A.J., Trivedi, M.H., Wisniewski, S.R., Nierenberg, A.A., Stewart, J.W., Warden, D., Niederehe, G., Thase, M.E., Lavori, P.W., Lebowitz, B.D., McGrath, P.J., Rosenbaum, J.F., Sackeim, H.A., Kupfer, D.J., Luther, J., Fava, M. Acute and longer-term outcomes in depressed outpatients requiring one or several treatment steps: a STAR*D report. American Journal of Psychiatry, 163:1905-1917, 2006.Rush, A.J., Koran, L.M., Keller, M.B., Markowitz, J.C., Harrison, W.M., Miceli, R.J., Fawcett, J.A., Gelenberg, A.J., Hirschfeld, R.M.A., Klein, D.N., Kocsis, J.H., McCullough, J.P., Schatzberg, A.J. and Thase, M.E. The treatment of chronic depression, Part 1: Study design and rationale for evaluating the comparative efficacy of sertraline and imipramine as acute, crossover, continuation, and maintenance phase therapies. Journal of Clinical Psychiatry, 59:589-597, 1998.Rush has two sons, Matthew John Rush and Augustus John Rush III, and three grandchildren. He presently resides in Santa Fe, New Mexico, with his wife, Dee Miller Rush. He provides consultation to individuals as well as academic, governmental and industrial organizations.
