Prof. Eduard Vieta

Eduard Vieta is Professor of Psychiatry and Chair at the University of Barcelona, and Head of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychology at the Hospital Clínic, Barcelona, Spain, where he also leads the Bipolar and Depressive Disorders Program. His unit is one of the worldwide leaders in clinical care, teaching and research on affective disorders and precision psychiatry. He is also Scientific Director of the Spanish Research Network on Mental Health (CIBERSAM).

Professor Vieta has received various awards, including: the Aristotle Award, the Mogens Schou Award by the International Society of Bipolar Disorders, the Colvin Prize by the Brain & Behavior Foundation, the Clinical Neuroscience Lilly award by the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology, the Simon Bolivar Award by the American Psychiatric Association, the Excellence Award by the College of Physicians, the Trueta Award by the Medical Sciences Academy, and the Dissemination and Humanities Award by the University of Barcelona. He has been named best psychiatrist in Spain (Monitor Sanitario, El Español), is an honorary member of the Spanish Society of Biological Psychiatry and has also been awarded Doctor Honoris Causa by the University of Valencia. He is a member of the Royal Academy of Medicine of Catalonia.

Professor Vieta has authored more than 1,000 original articles, 500 book chapters and 50 books. His h-index is 144, he has over 80,000 citations and his papers have had over 700,000 downloads. He is the most cited author worldwide on bipolar disorder, has been listed as one of the “World’s most influential minds” and is oin the Best Doctors list by Forbes. Furthermore, he is Editor-in-Chief of European Neuropsychopharmacology, has served as Invited Professor at McLean Hospital and Harvard University, Massachusetts, USA and as Neuroscience Scientific Advisor to the European Presidency.

https://publons.com/researcher/3112917/eduard-vieta/

The emerging field of precision psychiatry (Vieta, 2015) aims at finding biomarkers and biosignatures that may aid in confirming the diagnosis and/or identifying the best treatment for a given patient. This may be particularly relevant for the field of bipolar disorder, where diagnostic uncertainties and diversity of treatment options are very present (Oliva et al., 2024). For example, a European initiative called EDIT-B, funded by EIT-Health, has developed a kit of epigenetic markers that allow for an accurate differential diagnosis between bipolar and unipolar depression, facilitating treatment choice (Salvetat et al, 2022). With regards to Research Networks, one of the pioneering efforts was ENBREC (European Network of Bipolar Expert Centers) funded by the European Union (Henry et al, 2013). Currently, the main European research network on this condition is the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology Network on Bipolar Disorder (Kessing et al, 2021). Several national Networks exist across Europe: examples are CIBERSAM in Spain (Salagre et al, 2019), Fondamental in France (Leboyer et al, 2022), the UK Bipolar Network and other. Moreover, these networks collaborate in international global efforts such as the Psychiatric Genomic Consortium, the Consortium on Lithium Genetics, and ENIGMA. Currently ongoing European projects on Precision Psychiatry for Bipolar Disorders include R-LINK, PSY-PGX, and PSY-STRATA. These projects and further perspectives on psychopharmacological, neuromodulation, and psychosocial intervention advances will be discussed during the presentation.

• Vieta E, Tohen M, McIntosh D, Kessing LV, Sajatovic M, McIntyre RS (2025). Early use of long-acting injectable antipsychotics in bipolar disorder type I: An expert consensus. Bipolar Disord. 2025; 27: 7-16. doi:10.1111/bdi.13498
• Anmella G, Corponi F, Li BM, et al. (2024). Identifying digital biomarkers of illness activity and treatment response in bipolar disorder with a novel wearable device (TIMEBASE): protocol for a pragmatic observational clinical study. BJPsych Open. 2024;10(5):e137. doi:10.1192/bjo.2024.716
• Vieta E (2015). Tough times never last too long: the future of psychopharmacology. World Psychiatry. 2023 Feb;22(1):84-85. doi: 10.1002/wps.21066
• Vieta E (2015). Personalized medicine applied to mental health: Precision psychiatry. Rev Psiquiatr Salud Ment. 2015 Jul-Sep;8(3):117-8. DOI: 10.1016/j.rpsmen.2015.03.007
• Oliva V et al. (2024). Bipolar disorders: an update on critical aspects. Regional Health Europe 2024; 29;48:101135.
• Salvetat et al. (2022). A game changer for bipolar disorder diagnosis using RNA editing-based biomarkers. Transl Psychiatry. 2022 May 4;12(1):182.
• Henry et al. (2013). European Network of Bipolar Research Expert Centre (ENBREC): a network to foster research and promote innovative care. J Bipolar Disord. 2013 Apr 17;1:2.
• Kessing et al. (2021). DSM-5 and ICD-11 criteria for bipolar disorder: Implications for the prevalence of bipolar disorder and validity of the diagnosis - A narrative review from the ECNP bipolar disorders network. Neuropsychopharmacol. 2021 Jun;47:54-61.
• Leboyer et al. (2022). Key findings on bipolar disorders from the longitudinal FondaMental Advanced Center of Expertise-Bipolar Disorder (FACE-BD) cohort. Affect Disord. 2022 Jun 15;307:149-156.
• Salagre et al. (2019). Psiquiatr Salud Ment (Engl Ed). 2019 Jan-Mar;12(1):1-8.