Elias Shaya
MD, PhD
In addition to his administrative and leadership responsibilities, he maintains an active clinical practice, specializing in geriatric psychiatry, dementia, and mood disorders. He holds part-time faculty appointments in Radiology and Medicine at The Johns Hopkins University and in Health Sciences at the George Washington University.
Dr. Shaya, one of the first clinicians in the country to receive dual training in psychiatry and nuclear medicine, has experience using functional brain imaging technologies, especially Positron Emission Tomography, to study neuropsychiatric disorders. Dr. Shaya's other research and interest include geriatric and neuropsychiatry, mood disorders, as well as electronic health records and innovations in care delivery, clinical documentation, CPT coding & payment models. His work has been published in journals, such as Neuropsychopharmacology, The American Journal of Psychiatry, and The Journal of Neurochemistry, and he is a contributing author of the book "The Everything Health Guide to Schizophrenia: The latest information on treatment, medication, and coping strategies."
In addition to his clinical, research, and academic pursuits, Dr. Shaya serves on the Board of Directors of the MedStar Good Samaritan Hospital, Maryland Foundation for Psychiatry, and is Chairman of the Board for Drug-Free Lebanon, a non-profit organization dedicated to helping treatment centers in Lebanon provide preventive care and treatment for those afflicted with addictions.
Prior to joining MedStar, he was in private practice and early in his career, he was a researcher at Johns Hopkins University and the National Institutes of Health, where he served as a Senior Fellow at the National Institute on Drug Abuse. He is a graduate of The American University in Beirut, Lebanon, and he completed his internship and residency at Emory University Affiliated Hospitals in Atlanta, GA, followed by a fellowship at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. He is board certified in General and Geriatric Psychiatry. He also is certified in Office-Based Treatment of Opioid Dependence with Buprenorphine.
Dr. Shaya has been a regularly invited speaker at local, national, and international meetings as well as regular appearances and interviews on TV, radio, and in the written press.
Dr. Shaya has been recognized in Baltimore Magazine's "Top Doctors" and "Guide to America's Top Psychiatrists" for several years in a row and he is the recipient of several local and national awards, honors, and recognitions including:
- The Distinguished Fellowship Award of the American Psychiatric Association
- The Exemplary Psychiatrist Award of the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI)
Research Interests
Dr. Shaya's areas of research include
- Geriatric psychiatry
- Dementia
- Mood disorders
- Neuropsychopharmacology
- Neurochemistry
- Nuclear medicine
- Health outcomes
- Psychiatry in the primary-care setting
- Research into psychiatric health disparities
- Innovations in the delivery of care
- Health policy pertaining to mental health parity
- Substance abuse prevention and treatment
- Electronic medical records and confidentiality of the mental health record
Selected Research
Dr. Shaya is currently collaborating with the National Institute on Aging on a study investigating a new pharmacotherapeutic agent in the treatment of Mild Cognitive Impairment and Alzheimer's Dementia.
He was a co-investigator on the BRIDGE (Blacks Receiving Interventions for Depression and Gaining Empowerment) study, a cluster randomized trial that compared the effectiveness of standard quality improvement interventions and patient-centered quality improvement interventions in an African-American patient population in under-resourced community-based practices. The study was designed to provide evidence about whether patient-centered accommodations improve quality of care and outcomes to a greater extent than standard quality improvement strategies for African Americans with depression.
Research Areas
- Psychiatry/Mental Health