Farooq Naeem

Farooq Naeem is the Chief, General Adult and Health Systems Psychiatry at the Centre for Addiction & Mental Health and a Professor of Psychiatry at University of Toronto. He was trained in Psychiatry in Merseyside training scheme in Liverpool, England. He completed MSc in Research Methods in Health and later a PhD from the Southampton University, Southampton, England.  He also received training in Lean thinking and in quality improvement in England.

He is also a Cognitive Behaviour Therapist. In addition to CBT for common mental health disorders, he received training in CBT for psychosis from Professor David Kingdon while working as his lecturer during training. 

Farooq pioneered techniques for culturally adapting CBT. These techniques were used to adapt CBT for a variety of common and severe mental health problems in South Asia, North Africa, Middle East and China. He has conducted nearly 20 RCTs along with colleagues from Southampton and Manchester Universities in England. He is considered a leader in global mental health.

He has a keen interest in health systems. He has worked as an expert in Lean Thinking and Quality Improvement in England, Canada and in some low and middle income countries. He has written 6 books and numerous book chapters. He has published more than 150 papers in peer reviewed journals. He has presented his work in numerous conferences and has conducted many workshops on CBT, especially CBT for psychosis globally.

Research Synopsis

His areas of research include CBT, Psychosis and Culture with an overall aim to improve access to CBT. He has also published on issues related to health services and quality improvement. He works with a team of IT experts and has developed a CBT based therapy program that can be delivered through web and smart phone apps,” eGuru”.