In July 2023, we changed our name from AACC (short for the American Association for Clinical Chemistry) to the Association for Diagnostics & Laboratory Medicine (ADLM). The following page was written prior to this rebranding and contains mentions of the association’s old name. It may contain other out-of-date information as well.
1988 International Travel Fellowship
Paul J. Orsulak will receive the 10th AACCInternational Fellowship Award, sponsored by Becton Dickinson Vacutainer Systems, Becton Dickinson & Company.
Dr. Orsulak is professor of psychiatry and pathology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center and chief of the Psychiatric Clinical Diagnostic Laboratory, Veterans Administration Medical Center in Dallas, TX. His research interests include analyzing the interface between psychiatry and clinical chemistry, monitoring therapeutic antidepressants, studying the biochemistry of psychoactive drugs, and developing clinical chemistry methods that have applications in psychiatry.
Dr. Orsulak is a graduate of the University of Scranton, where he received his B.S. degree, with honors, in chemistry. As an undergraduate, Dr. Orsulak participated in a research program investigating the biochemistry of Down’s syndrome and worked with Dr. Martin D. Appleton and others under a grant from the Scranton Area Foundation. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in biochemistry from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA, where he was a National Institute of Child Health and Human Development trainee.
Before moving to Dallas, TX, Dr. Orsulak was assistant professor of psychiatry, Harvard Medical School, at the Massachusetts Mental Health Center. While at Harvard, he worked with Dr. Joseph Schildkraut and many colleagues investigating the neuropharmacology of depressions and schizophrenias. In 1977 Dr. Orsulak was appointed staff associate in the Department of Pathology, New England Deaconess Hospital, where he co-founded a laboratory for specialized research studies and education in psychiatric chemistry and one of the first therapeutic drug-monitoring programs for antidepressants in the United States.
Dr. Orsulak has authored or co-authored more than 60 papers and numerous book chapters on his research and has been a regular contributor to educational programs for AACC, the American Society of Clinical Pathologists, and other professional organizations.
He is a member of the American Psychiatric Association Task Force on the use of laboratory measures in psychiatry, the Society of Biological Psychiatry, and the Society of Sigma Xi; in addition, Dr. Orsulak is a fellow of the American Institute of Chemists. In 1971 he received the prestigious Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr., Foundation Student Award in mental retardation.
During his 10 years as a member of AACC, Dr. Orsulak has been actively involved in many AACC programs. He has served on both the AACC Task Force and the subcommittees on therapeutic drug monitoring, helped to organize the 1983 A. O. Beckman Conference entitled “Brain, Biochemistry, and Behavior,” and recently directed the program for a national conference on therapeutic monitoring of antidepressant drugs held in Dallas, TX.
Dr. Orsulak has been a corresponding editor for Clinical Chemistry News and a regular contributor to the therapeutic drug monitoring and the endocrinology educational programs. He is a member of the Texas Section of AACC and a member of its Therapeutic Drug Monitoring and Clinical Toxicology Division.