Welcome to the Center for Mental Health Innovation
Bonnie Nagel, Ph.D.
Director, Center for Mental Health Innovation
Dr. Nagel is a licensed pediatric neuropsychologist and Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at Oregon Health & Science University, where she serves as the Senior Associate Vice President for Research, Vice Chair for Research in the Department of Psychiatry, and directs the Center for Mental Health Innovation. Dr. Nagel's lab has been conducting longitudinal studies for nearly 20 years, with aims toward identifying biopsychosocial predictors of risk and resilience for psychopathology, including addiction, depression, and suicidality. This work, which has been continuously funded by the National Institutes of Health and philanthropy, is framed toward ultimately informing more targeted precision mental health intervention and problem prevention efforts. She is a Principal Investigator on several national multi-site projects toward that end, including the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study.
Joel Nigg, Ph.D.
Co-Director, Center for Mental Health Innovation
Dr. Nigg is a Professor and Vice Chair for Psychology and Co-Director of the Center for Mental Health Innovation at Oregon Health & Science University. He obtained his A.B. at Harvard College, M.S.W. at The University of Michigan, and Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of California at Berkeley. He is a licensed clinical psychologist with clinical experience in multiple settings. He is a leading researcher in the area of developmental psychopathology with a focus on ADHD. He and his teams have published some 200 peer reviewed scientific papers in addition to numerous chapters, editorials, and commentaries; his work has been cited nearly 20,000 times in the literature. He is the author of 2 books on ADHD. His work has been funded continuously by NIMH for over 20 years. The recipient of several awards, he has served on the editorial boards of several leading scientific journals.
Learn how you can support the acceleration of our team’s successful and innovative research
Welcome to the Center for Mental Health Innovation! The Center grew out of a commitment established by OHSU in 2009 to make major contributions in development and mental health. Initially an ADHD Research Program was created and, with the help of a $12.5 million gift from the Sharp Family Abracadabra Foundation, was established as a Center in 2019. Further expansions of the program followed until it became clear that a broader focus was in order.
In 2023, OHSU and the Sharp Family decided to expand the mission and scope to a broader range of developmental psychiatric and mental health concerns and to both discover mechanisms of mental disorder and develop and implement improvements in clinical care more directly; the Center was rechristened as the Center for Mental Health Innovation. Its goal is to accelerate discovery and solutions for mental disorders.
The Center seeks breakthroughs in several areas of investigation from genes to brain to behavior, and from fundamental clinical and mechanistic discovery to new clinical care approaches. These areas of work are described throughout the site. Please explore this website to learn about our work. We are excited about the prospects for continued rapid progress.
Referrals and assessments
A referral is required in order to be considered for a consultation or assessment prior to scheduling. Call the Adult, Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Clinic at 503-494-6176