Thomas B. Strouse, MD

Dr. Tom Strouse is Professor of Clinical Psychiatry and the inaugural holder of the Maddie Katz Chair in Palliative Care Research and Education. He is also Vice-Chair for Clinical Affairs in the Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine. Dr. Strouse served as the Chief Medical Officer of the Stewart and Lynda Resnick Neuropsychiatric Hospital at UCLA from 2007 through 2021.

Dr. Strouse is currently engaged clinically in the UCLA Neuromodulation Clinical and Research Service, focused on rTMS and a novel device called Scrambler for the treatment of neuropathic pain. He is also part of the leadership group of the nascent UCLA Psychedelics Research Initiative and is engaged in startup of a multi-site prospective trial of Psilocybin in palliative care patients with demoralization.

Dr. Strouse has been a faculty member at UCLA since he completed his residency training there in 1991. Early in his career he was director of the UCLA Consultation/Liaison Psychiatry Service and worked closely with the UCLA Liver Transplant Program for more than a decade. He served from 1994-2007 as director of Cancer Pain Management and Supportive Oncology Services at the Outpatient Cancer Center at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where he developed additional interest and skills in palliative medicine. He has spent his career working with medically ill adults coping with psychiatric and physical aspects of catastrophic illness. Along with his current efforts to promote palliative care clinical research within the UCLA Health System, Dr. Strouse is a faculty member in the combined GLA/UCLA Palliative Medicine Fellowship, and is actively engaged with UCLA’s Operation Mend, a program for wounded US servicemen and women.

Dr. Strouse is a Fellow of the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine, a Fellow of the Academy of Consultation/Liaison Psychiatry, and an American Psychiatric Association Distinguished Life Fellow.  He is board certified in general psychiatry, consultation/liaison psychiatry, and hospice/palliative medicine.

From 2007-2018 Dr. Strouse served on American Board of Internal Medicine Test Committee responsible for writing the certifying exam for all North American physician candidates for the ABMS subspecialty of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.  He chaired the committee from 2014-2018 and continues to assist ABIM with exam development.

Dr. Strouse has published many peer reviewed papers and book chapters and sits on the editorial boards of a number of important journals. In 2017 he became an Associate Editor for the Journal of Palliative Medicine. He lectures throughout the country on topics related to pain, palliative care, psycho-oncology, and psychiatric aspects of medical illness. He was educated at Pomona College and the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.