Ovidio Bermudez, MD, FAAP, FSAHM, FAED, CEDS
Medical Director of Child & Adolescent Services and Chief Medical Officer at Eating Recovery Center in Denver, Colorado
Ovidio Bermudez, M.D is the Medical Director of Child & Adolescent Services and Chief Medical Officer at Eating Recovery Center in Denver, Colorado. He holds academic appointments as Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Pediatrics at the University Of Oklahoma College Of Medicine and Clinical Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Colorado School of Medicine. He is Board certified in Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.
Dr. Bermudez is a Fellow of the Academy for Eating Disorders, the Society for Adolescent Medicine, and the American Academy of Pediatrics. He is Past Chairman and current member of the Board of Directors of the National Eating Disorders Association, Co-Founder of the Eating Disorders Coalition of Tennessee (EDCT), Co-founder of the Oklahoma Eating Disorders Association (OEDA), and a founding member of Houston Eating Disorders Specialists (HEDS). He is a member of the International Association of Eating Disorders Professionals and a Certified Eating Disorders Specialist.
Dr Bermudez has lectured nationally and internationally on eating disorders, childhood obesity, and other topics related to pediatric and adult healthcare and has been repeatedly recognized for his dedication and advocacy in the field of eating disorders.
Peter Gaumond
Chief, Recovery Branch at Office of National Drug Control Policy Executive Office of the President
Peter Gaumond is responsible for leading the activities of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy's (ONDCP) Recovery Branch. The branch engages the recovery community on a range of policy issues, seeks to bring recovery to the center of national drug policy, and fosters the development of recovery-focused systems and services. Mr. Gaumond has more than 20 years of experience in the treatment and recovery field.
Prior to joining ONDCP, he served as a Senior Associate at Altarum Institute, where he provided technical assistance to states and tribes under the SAMHSA/CSAT Access to Recovery Program, and at Abt Associates, where he served as Project Manager for the SAMHSA/CSAT Partners for Recovery Initiative. Before that, Mr. Gaumond served as the Administrator of Program Development for the Illinois Division of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse. In that role, he was charged with improving systems and services, and overseeing a wide range of initiatives, programs and projects budgeted at approximately $30 million annually. Before joining the State of Illinois, he served as a program director, family educator, and counselor in the addictions treatment field; as an English and French instructor; and, as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Burkina-Faso, West Africa. Mr. Gaumond holds an MA from the University of Chicago, School of Social Service Administration and a BA in English from Marquette University. He also studied at the Université de Paris V (Académie Rene Descartes) and at the Université de Paris IV (La Sorbonne).
Kitty Harris, Ph.D., LMFT, LCDC
Director, Center for the Study of Addiction and Recovery
Associate Dean Outreach and Engagement, College of Human Sciences
Texas Tech University
Dr. Kitty Harris is currently the Associate Dean of Outreach and Engagement in the College of Human Sciences and holds the George C. Miller Regent's Professorship at Texas Tech University. Since 2002, she has served as the Director of the Center for the Study of Addiction and Recovery (CSAR) at Texas Tech University. Dr. Harris currently holds LCDC (Licensed Chemical Dependency Counselor) and LMFT (Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist) licenses.
She has private practice and institutional clinical experience working with adult and adolescent populations. Dr. Harris teaches in the areas of Addictive Disorders and Recovery Studies; Community, Family and Addiction Services; Human Development and Family Studies; Educational and Counseling Psychology; and Communications, Civility and Ethics in the Honors College.
In addition, Dr. Harris was the recipient of the national America Honors Recovery Award in 2007. She is a Fellow in the U.S. Department of Education's Higher Education Center for Alcohol, Drug Abuse, and Violence Prevention. She is a founding member of the Association of Recovery in Higher Education.
Dr. Harris is a noted public speaker, and presenter at national conferences, workshops and seminars on topics including adolescence; substance abuse prevention; addiction and recovery; and communication, civility and leadership.
She is the author of Women and Recovery-Finding Hope, published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and co-editor of Substance Abuse Recovery in College, published by Springer. www.kshwconsulting.com
John F. Kelly, Ph.D.
Associate Professor in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School
Program Director, Addiction Recovery Management Service
Associate Director, Center for Addiction Medicine,
Massachusetts General Hospital
Dr. Kelly is an Associate Professor in Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School, the founder and Director of the Recovery Research Institute at the Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), the Program Director of the Addiction Recovery Management Service (ARMS) and the Associate Director of the Center for Addiction Medicine at MGH. Dr. Kelly is President Elect of the American Psychological Association (APA) Society of Addiction Psychology, and is also a Fellow of APA. He has served as a consultant to U.S. federal agencies such as the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), and the national Institutes of Health (NIH); to non-Federal institutions, such as the Betty Ford Institute and the Hazelden Foundation; and internationally to the British Parliament Drugs Misuse Taskforce.
He is currently an Associate Editor for the journals, Addiction, and the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment. He has published more than 100 peer-reviewed articles, reviews, and chapters in the field of addiction. His clinical and research work has focused on addiction treatment and the recovery process which has included specific research on the effectiveness of mutual-help groups, such as Alcoholics Anonymous, as adjuncts to formal care. His additional research endeavors have focused on the translation and implementation of evidence-based practice, addiction and criminal justice, addiction treatment theories and mechanisms of action, and reducing stigma associated with addiction. He is a licensed clinical psychologist actively working with individuals and families with alcohol and other drug use disorders.
Alexandre B. Laudet, Ph.D.
Director, Center for the Study of Addictions and Recovery, National Development and Research Institutes, Inc. (NDRI)
Alexandre B. Laudet, Ph.D, is an internationally recognized expert in addiction recovery. Her federally funded research in the past 15 years focuses on elucidating what helps people with drugs and/or alcohol problems quit drinking or getting high and how they stay in recovery. A social psychologist, her main goals are to build the science of recovery and to help translate findings into services and policy that create opportunities for long-term recovery and improved quality of life for people with substance problems. She leads the Center for the Study of Addictions and Recovery at the National Development and Research Institutes, Inc. (NDRI) and provides training and consultancy to government and community-based agencies on promoting opportunities for sustained recovery. She regularly publishes in peer-reviewed journals, presents at national and international conferences, and serves on the editorial board of several scientific publications.
Alexandre also serves as pro bono Director of Science and Strategy for the Global Recovery Initiative- a not-for-profit 501(c)3 social enterprise that seeks to help transform social attitudes and policy to expand opportunities for recovery and remove social, cultural, legal, and policy barriers to recovery through science and information dissemination to all stakeholder groups.
Christopher Kennedy Lawford, J.D.
Advocacy, Policy Reform and Collaborating with Public Officials
Christopher Kennedy Lawford spent 20 years in the film and television industries as an actor, lawyer, executive and producer. He is the author of two New York Times bestselling books, Symptoms of Withdrawal: A memoir of Snapshots and Redemption (2005) and Moments of Clarity (2009). He has also published Healing Hepatitis C (2009) and his newest work, Recovery to Live, Kick Any Habit, Manage Any Addiction, is forthcoming.
In recovery for more than 26 years from drug addiction, Mr. Lawford campaigns tirelessly on behalf of the recovery community in both the public and private sectors. He presently works with the United Nations, the Canadian Center on Substance Abuse, the White House Office on Drug Control Policy and the World Health Organization. He also consults with Fortune 500 companies and numerous non-profit groups, speaking around the world on issues related to addition, mental health and Hepatitis C.
In 2009, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appointed Mr. Lawford to the California Public Health Advisory Committee. In 2011, Mr. Lawford was named Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Office on Drugs & Crime to promote activities supporting drug treatment, care and recovery. He also serves and National Advocacy Consultant for Caron Treatment Centers.
Kevin McCauley, M.D.
The Institute for Addiction Study, Salt Lake City, Utah
Kevin McCauley is a graduate of the Medical College of Pennsylvania. After completion of medical school, he joined the Navy and became a Naval Flight Surgeon. After earning his wings at Pensacola, Florida he was assigned to a Marine helicopter squadron (The Red Lions). Later he was transferred to Marine F/A-18 Hornet squadron (Sharpshooters). While working as a flight surgeon he treated pilots with alcohol and drug problems.
As a physician, he advocates strongly for the rights of addicts as patients. Dr. McCauley has made his mark in the field of addiction treatment by tirelessly educating the world about the Disease Model of Addiction. He is also one of the lead administrators at Le Mont Michel, a ten-bed recovery management/sober living program in Utah. More recently, Dr. McCauley has become best known for his full-length movie, "Pleasure Unwoven", which explains the neuroscience of addiction to people in recovery and their families.
Matt Russell, Ph.D.
Cambridge University
Matthew Russell P.h.D. is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the University of Cambridge's Psychology and Religion Research Group (PRRG) exploring the interface between psychology and religion in theoretical, empirical and applied ways. He is also a Tutor at Cambridge Theological Federation. He received his Masters of Divinity from Fuller Theological Seminary and completed his Ph.D. at Texas Tech University in 2010. His dissertation explored how women construct alternative narratives of redemption from years of sustained drug and alcohol abuse.
Prior to Cambridge he was the Associate Director at Texas Tech University's Center for the Study of Addiction and Recovery and was responsible for the replication model where he helped to establish Collegiate Recovery Communities in campus' across the United States. He has recently been appointed to Duke University in the School of Divinity.