Welcome to the 20th WCP Virtual Congress Program Scheduling

This symposium is sponsored by the Education in Psychiatry and ECP Sections of the WPA. With fast advances in information technologies, and the widespread and ubiquitous use of smartphone and Web applications, it seems paramount to take advantage of modern technologies to enhance the learning experience in psychiatry among medical students and psychiatry residents. Traditional unidirectional learning methods (one delivers, and others passively receive information) fail to sustain attention and concentration among students, lead to boredom, dissociation and fatigue, and reduce the overall quality of the learning experience. This symposium will discuss pros and cons of different modern technological tools of education and show participants how to implement them in educational activities. Technology-based pedagogical tools may create a learning environment characterized by engagement of the target audience via sensory augmentation with enhanced virtual and live interaction among presenters and participants to improve the educational outcome. Symposium panelists from North America, Asia, Africa and Europe will address the use of live quizzes and surveys in education in psychiatry, examine the use of virtual reality in education in psychiatry, and present a pilot interactive tele-education program for psychiatry residents in India, China and the US.

Anxiety, stress and obsessive-compulsive-related symptoms and disorders are common and associated with considerable per¬sonal and societal burden. However, the clinical management of is often sub-optimal, owing to the wide range of different disorders, their co-morbidity with other disorders (particularly mood disorders), and the low confi¬dence of many practitioners in their management. In this presentation , expert speakers will review some of the recent advances in the clinical management of anxiety disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder and obsessive-compulsive and related disorders, paying reference to evidence-based treatment guidelines and touching upon recognition and diagnosis, acute treatment, longer-term treatment, combination treatment, and further approaches for patients who have not responded to first-line interventions. We include an exceptionally talented female early career scientist as a presenter. Learning objectives include an update in the state of the art clinical management of Anxiety and Fear-Related Disorders, new ways for managing the psychiatric effects of trauma and new treatments for Obsessive-Compulsive and Related Disorders.

The symposium will illustrate the ways and means to prevent and reduce specific problems of megacities. These topics will include rural to urban migration, formation of megacities worldwide, loss of community, isolation, problems of youth, women, and elderly. Also, positive aspects of urbanization will be presented. Urban settings all over the world are very vulnerable to and heavily affected by COVID-19. The pandemic showed how social inequalities were critical to define the obstacles of implementing quarantine in the outskirts of large cities, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. The economic losses, unemployment, food insecurity, and increase in social inequality is generating acute stress which did mostly affect the mental health of the underprivileged in big cities. These chronic stresses may be associated with increases in depression and suicide, in a large scale. The presentation will comprise an update of the pandemic effects in peoples lives and how mental health systems of big cities are responding to this emerging demand. Humanity has never needed mental health professionals as much as it does now, and many countries are not prepared to deal with this new post-pandemic scenario. Mental health professionals are expected, in addition to a solidary commitment to care for people in distress, is that they adopt practices based on solid scientific knowledge.

This state-of-the-art Symposium is organized by the three WPA Sections on Schizophrenia , Rehabilitation, and Psychiatry in Developing Countries. It is focusing on the recently approved ICD-11 with its chapter and clinical guidelines on schizophrenia, referring to innovative treatment guidelines with a focus on rehabilitation, and on the newest results on prognosis and outcome. W. Gaebel will be presenting on the new classification and clinical guidelines of ICD-11 for schizophrenia or other primary psychotic disorders, focusing on major changes including the introduction of new generic symptom and course qualifiers and their impact on developing an individual treatment plan. K. Wannasewok will review the evidence-based practices of psychosocial rehabilitation for people living with schizophrenia focusing on the most recently published guidelines for schizophrenia and schizophrenia spectrum disorders. R. Nagpal will focus on new findings of prognosis and outcome in schizophrenia from the perspective of developing nations to disentangle the complex framework of factors contributing to similarities and differences in comparison with developed countries. P. Udomratn as discussant will synergize the essence of the presentations with respect to current improvements in clinical diagnostics, management and care of people with schizophrenia and other psychotic disorders and the next steps to be taken in clinical practice and research. Learning objectives: To provide the recently approved ICD-11 with its chapter and clinical guidelines on schizophrenia or other primary psychotic disorders, referring to innovative treatment guidelines with a focus on rehabilitation, and on the newest results on prognosis and outcome comparing developing countries and developed countries. *organized by three WPA sections: Sections on Schizophrenia, Rehabilitation, Psychiatry in Developing Countries

In this symposium, to be sponsored by the Section of Transcultural Psychiatry, the speakers will highlight the transcultural aspects of mental health care. Prof Schouler-Ocak will present scientific evidence related to the doctor- patient relationship and the influence of different cultural tenets on the therapeutic alliance. Dr Foresti-Zubaran will present scientific evidence obtained from a research conducted in Australia in which a groups of migrant and Australian-born women were investigated; considerations with regard to the provision of mental health services to individuals of culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds will also be made. Finally, Prof Carlos Zubaran Jr will present a lecture on the leadership in mental health and the transcultural aspects in this field. Prof. Sergio Villasenor Bayardo will provide the audience with concluding remarks and conclusions on such an important topic, the transcultural contours of the provision of mental health care, from doctor-patient relationship to leadership and service delivery.

Climate change is one of the most relevant problems of our era and is becoming more and more a nightmare. Its consequences on exposed biological subjects and on vulnerable human groups and societies is challenging scientists and policy makers. Rising temperatures, heat waves, floods, tornadoes, hurricanes, droughts, fires, loss of forests and ice, advancement of deserts can cause human suffering and pathologies both directly and indirectly. Likewise, air wasting and pollution, that are partly due to weather changes, can induce health problems. Beyond somatic illnesses, environment-related mental disorders, as to symptoms, distress and disability, are still scarcely investigated. The effects of climate change may span both in the short and in the long term, even delayed. Some events are able to act directly at the nervous tissue level and provoke structural and functional alterations, whereas other events are able to act indirectly through the mechanisms of stress and trauma (acute and post-traumatic disorders) leading to more or less defined psychopathological patterns. The consequences of extreme or prolonged weather events may be persistent and detectable also in the subsequent generations. Vulnerable populations are at risk for mental health problems because of their geographical exposure and socio-cultural conditions. The present symposium summarizes the evidence existing worldwide about the current impact of climate change on mental health.

This symposium will provide an overview of Psychoneuroimmunology as it relates to psychiatric and neuropsychiatric disorders. Although a relatively young field, new horizons have been opened in our understanding of the complex interrelationships between the immune and the nervous, cardiovascular and gastrointestinal systems providing new avenues for the diagnosis and management of very complex disorders. Hitherto unexplored pathways have been identified that present unprecedent opportunities for innovative research and new targets for drug development. Validated biomarkers promise objective diagnostic classification of psychiatric disorders and understanding of the high comorbidity between them and medical and neurological diseases. Immune biomarkers, neurotrophins, antibodies and gene drug interactions may enable prediction of response and reversal of treatment resistance. Imaging techniques of increasing sophistication help visualize aberrant connectivity and dysfunctional brain circuitry. The goal of practicing personalized psychiatry is now closer to becoming reality than ever before. After a brief introduction, the speakers will address the themes of this symposium. Dr. Bechter will discuss the mild encephalitis hypothesis as a special type of neuroinflammation and a plausible cause of brain dysfunction and psychiatric syndromes recently materialized by the first international Consensus diagnosis of Autoimmune Psychosis with respective treatment recommendations. Dr. Meyer will address neuroimaging in the diagnosis and staging of psychiatric disorders with a focus on markers related to gliosis. Dr. Benros will discuss anti-inflammatory treatments to arrest neuroprogression. Dr. Halaris will present new data focusing on genetic polymorphisms in the expression of C-reactive protein and their contribution to a proinflammatory status and treatment resistance.

Human rights have different challenges in different cultures and countries that have impact on mental health. The human rights of woman are challenged all over the world despite a countrie`s acceptance of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights. This session will present how violations of human rights from different cultures have impact on woman`s life and mental health. Dr Chonnakarn Jatchavala will present from Thailand "The Plight of Thai pregnant Employees: Psychiatric Reflections on the Rule of Law" and how the Thai Labor protection act effect Thai women with a special focus on the lack of legal rights for pregnant woman and woman`s mental health. Dr Meryam Shoular-Orcak from Germany will present "Suicidality in woman and girls in humanitarian crisis" and how woman has a stronger tendency to develop PTSD wich may be related to that the traumas they are exposed to such as sexual assault and rape are socially stigmatized and therefore do not recieve sufficient support. Dr Josyan Madi-Skaff from Lebanon will present on "The status of human rights in the Middle East and its impact on the mental health of women".

Neurophysiology studies in patients with psychiatric disorders reveal differences of neuronal activity at rest and upon task related stimulation. In addition alterations of temporal dynamics and functional connectivity have been demonstrated depending on disease states and activations by stimuli. Neuronal reactions and brain functional activities of disease specific or syndrome associated states can be modulated by neurofeedback guided strategies, and brain stimulation techniques, particularly non-invasive ones such as transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS). This symposium will provide an overview of the significance of neurophysiology techniques in neuropsychiatric disorders, where they complement diagnostic and monitoring procedures, and contribute to therapeutic decisions or provide treatment strategies. Both clinical and research aspects will be highlighted under the balanced supervision of the expert discussant Sebastian Olbrich. In particular Oliver Pogarell will provide the clinical backgroud of the application of standard EEG in psychiatry and present data on neurofeedback in patients with addiction and affective disorders. Salvatore Campanella will defend the idea that cognitive ERPs could be used to monitor the evolution of a treatment, and then be used to orient post-treatment programs, through the example of alcohol dependence. Tomiki Sumiyoshi will provide data from clinical trials on the effect of multisession tDCS on cognitive function linked to daily-living skills in patients with schizophrenia. In Summary the symposium will present neurophysiological research and its potential for effective clinical applications in the field of neuropsychiatry and is aimed at demonstrating that psychiatric electrophysiology remains a valuable and up to date technique.