Alan Craig Swann

Alan Craig Swann, M.D.

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Alan Craig Swann, M.D.

Professor

Phone

713-798-6379

Request Clinical Appointment

Positions

Professor: Menninger Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences
Baylor College of Medicine
Houston, TX

Addresses

Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center (Hospital)
: 2002 Holcombe Blvd, Houston, TX 77030
Houston, TX 77030
United States

Jamail Specialty Care Center (Clinic)
: 1977 Butler Blvd., 4th floor
Houston, TX 77030
United States
Phone: (713) 798-4857

Education

MD from University of Texas Southwestern Medical School: 05/1972 - Dallas, Texas United States

Internship at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center: 06/1973 - New York, New York United States

Residency at Yale University School of Medicine: 07/1978 - New Haven, Connecticut United States

Certifications

Board Certified: American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology

Professional Interests

Affective Disorders
Bipolar disorder
Depression and mood disorders
Substance Use Disorders

Professional Statement

I am a Professor at Baylor College of Medicine and a staff psychiatrist at the Houston VA Medical Center. I have conducted extensive research combining clinical, neurophysiological, pharmacological, and human laboratory strategies to understand roles of impulsivity and catecholamine function in addictive disorders, cluster B personality disorders, and all phases of bipolar disorder, including the role of impulsivity in interactions between bipolar and addictive disorders and in suicidal behavior. These studies focus on early information processing and the balance between initiation and inhibition of action. We have shown that early, pre-attentive responses to stimuli are related to impulsive behavior and impaired response inhibition, with potential consequences including medically severe suicidal attempts. Catecholamine system function, interacting with glutamatergic and peptidergic systems, has a strong role in these phenomena. I also participated in a case control study of medically severe suicide attempts, funded by the Centers for Disease Control and National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, where we studied potentially lethal impulsive and non-impulsive suicide attempts. I have carried out substantial research with lithium, including its effects on catecholamine systems in bipolar disorder and in animal models, its effects on behavior, and its pharmacology. Human behavioral research has also focused on mechanisms by which depression combines with pathological activation, an important mechanism in suicide risk. My work in animals has focused on mechanisms of behavioral sensitization that appear to link catecholamine function to development of exaggerated behavioral responses to endogenous or exogenous rewards or stressors. These findings are especially germane to stress-related or recurrent conditions that may