A Little Information About Me
I am president of Indiana Health Group, which is the largest multidisciplinary behavioral health private practice in Indiana, established in 1987. I am a board certified psychiatrist and Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. I treat child, adolescent, adult, and geriatric patients. My areas of interest include psychopharmacology, mood and anxiety disorders, ADHD, sleep disorders, pain syndromes, and gambling addiction.

After graduating from Wabash College in 1989, I received my M.D. degree from the Indiana University School of Medicine in 1993 where I also completed my residency in 1997 and served as Chief Resident. I have served as a volunteer faculty member to the Indiana University School of Medicine. I joined Indiana Health Group in 1997.

I am a past President of the Indiana Psychiatric Society. I have also served as a delegate to the American Medical Association, as a representative to the American Psychiatric Association, and am on the Board of Directors of the Indianapolis Medical Society and the Board of Directors of the Indiana Branch of Mental Health America.

I have been named one of the “Top Doctors” and “Top Shrinks” by my peers in Indianapolis Monthly Magazine. In addition to clinical practice, I maintains a busy lecture schedule presenting over 100 presentations, teleconferences, and CME seminars each year across the nation and internationally.

I live on the north side of Indianapolis with my wife and three children and our greyhound. My hobbies include music, photography, computers, cooking and scuba diving.

Disclosure:
In the spirit of transparency and disclosure of my potential conflicts of interest, I would like to make you aware that I derive a significant portion of my income each year as a consultant for a number of pharmaceutical and educational companies.  I spend a good deal of my time traveling across the country lecturing to other healthcare professionals on the use of medications to treat certain conditions as well as speaking on certain disease states to professional and public audiences. I also consult with a variety of companies in several capacities including sales force training, speaker training for physicians and other healthcare professionals, and the development of scientific and marketing materials. I am compensated for this work according to the guidelines of Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA). I choose the medications and companies for whom I speak based on my clinical experience with the medications and my review of available scientific literature. I am only involved in educational and promotional activities for those medications which I use routinely in my practice. While I use nearly every available medication at some time, I frequently turn down offers from some companies whose medications I do not use as first line agents.

I am a member of the lecture bureau for the following companies:
Eli Lilly & Company
Cephalon
Janssen Pharmaceuticals
Jazz Pharmaceuticals
Medical World Conferences
Neuroscience Education Institute
Pan American Labs
Pfizer
Sepracor
Takeda Pharmaceuticals

Office Appointments
Office appointments may be scheduled for whatever length of time you desire. By default, my assistant will typically schedule your follow up appointment for 15 minutes. If your case is more complex, I may suggest scheduling a longer appointment time than 15 minutes for a medication management appointment. If you feel that you may need a longer appointment time than you scheduled, kindly notify our staff well in advance so that we may attempt to adjust the schedule accordingly and avoid inconveniencing other patients because of appointments running longer than scheduled. If your appointment does exceed your scheduled length, your bill will be adjusted accordingly.

Missed Appointments
Our office policy is to charge for appointments which are missed or not canceled with 24 hours notice. I typically will write off the first missed or late canceled appointment, but any additional missed or late-canceled appointments will be your financial responsibility.

Medication Refills
I make every effort to handle all mediation refill needs during your appointment. Should you need a refill between visits due to a change in your medication, simply contact our office by email (via Relay Health), phone, or fax and we will attend to your need. Medication refills needed due to missed appointments or failure to schedule an appointment in the recommended time frame will be subject to a medication refill charge.

Controlled Substances
Medications classified as controlled substances because of their addictive potential will not be refilled early or replaced if lost or stolen. Do not increase the dose of your controlled substance without discussing this with me first. You will run out of medication and it will not be refilled early. Abrupt discontinuation of some controlled substances (including but not limited to xanax, klonopin, ativan and their generics alprazolam, clonazepam, lorazepam) can be dangerous. If you run out of these medications early due to not taking them as directed, you may be referred to the hospital to more safely manage your detoxification from these medications.

"Stimulant Medications"
Stimulant medications are frequently used to treat symptoms of ADHD and ADD. These include but are not limited to adderall, adderall xr, concerta, focalin, focalin xr, ritalin, ritalin LA, vyvanse, daytrana, metadate, metadate cd, methylin, dexedrine. These medications are a special class of controlled substance known as Schedule II Controlled Substances. By law, prescriptions for these medications can not be phoned or faxed to the pharmacy and they can not be refilled. As of January 2008, we are allowed to provide you with 3 prescriptions for these medications at the time of your appointment (one for that date and two subsequent prescriptions for the two following months). In addition, most insurance that provides for mail order prescriptions will also permit a 3 month mail order supply of these medications. Schedule II medications are tracked carefully by the Drug Enforcement Agency. We will typically not be able to replace missing, lost, or stolen medications and prescriptions in this category, so it is vitally important keep these medications and prescriptions someplace safe and secure. When filling these prescriptions you will most likely be required to show a photo identification to pick them up at the pharmacy. Patients taking this category of medications must be seen at least every 90 days. Should you miss or cancel your appointment, you may not be able to receive a refill on your medication until such time that you can be rescheduled into the office for a follow up appointment. If our office needs to move your appointment, we will reschedule you at a time as close as possible to your original appointment and ensure that your prescription does not lapse.

Communication With Others Involved In Your Care
I will be happy to send a consult letter, report, etc. to anyone that you authorize. I typically suggest sending a copy of your initial evaluation and subsequent progress notes to your primary care physician and any specialists you may be seeing. This is of course completely up to you. We will only provide information to those persons for whom you have requested and signed a release of information. You are entitled to whatever level of confidentiality you desire. Those patients being seen on a cash-pay basis enjoy the additional privacy protection of not having your information accessed by insurance companies (unless coverage of a specific medication requires a limited release of information regarding your symptoms and past medication trials in order to obtain coverage for a medication through your insurance benefit). The three exceptions to confidentiality in which I am required by law to potentially break confidentiality are (1) if you pose an imminent danger to yourself, (2) if you pose an imminent danger to someone else, and (3) if I am aware of the ongoing abuse of a minor.