Message from our president |
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Precision psychiatry: highlights from January's GALENOS and ECNP’s Roadmap meetings
Dear ECNP members,
I hope that you had a good start to the new year, with a few days off and some time to sit back, relax, and enjoy the winter season. While ECNP has slowed down for a very short while, a number of activities have nevertheless kept us busy here since my last message. Not only did we have to do our homework after the last Executive Committee Meeting in December, but 2026 began with two more exciting scientific meetings.
First, the GALENOS Workshop on anhedonia, held in conjunction with the Wellcome Trust. GALENOS is a novel approach to generating living evidence in mental disorders, focusing on depression, anxiety, and psychosis, and is generously supported by Wellcome. Its aim is to provide systematic reviews on these phenotypes, drawing on both human and preclinical evidence; the two streams of evidence are then triangulated. In this way, converging evidence is identified that might otherwise go unnoticed. The reviews are continuously updated and therefore termed “living reviews.”
The first systematic living review focused on pro-dopaminergic treatments for anhedonia. Using this paper as a basis, a group of experts from both the Wellcome working groups and ECNP came together to discuss next steps: Where are the gaps in current research? What are the clinical implications?
A full day of stimulating discussions reawakened the very motives that brought me (and likely many others) into science: taking a deep dive into the literature, identifying open questions, and exploring possible ways forward. When do we ever find the time for this—uninterrupted by emails, meetings, phone calls, and the like? As this was the first workshop held in this format, it also served as a proof of concept. In my opinion, it worked extremely well, and I hope it will not be the last. Please stay tuned for the outcomes of the workshop!
With only a one-hour lunch break (for some of us…), the meeting seamlessly blended into the latest edition of our second Roadmap Meeting on Precision Psychiatry, held this year in Amsterdam. The meeting sparked enormous interest, and we could have accommodated far more in-person participants than the venue allowed; hopefully, those joining us online were also able to experience the lively atmosphere. A series of thought-provoking talks on the relevance and feasibility of biomarkers in precision psychiatry—particularly in the context of clinical trials—kept the audience engaged well beyond the sessions themselves, extending into all social interactions.
Highlights of the meeting included the keynote lecture by Steve Hyman, who also proved to be a challenging and stimulating discussant; a highly relevant talk by Seth Hopkins on biomarker enrichment of trials and its consequences; and a cutting-edge overview of AI-based biomarkers by Marc Aafjes. Of course, long-term ECNP supporters such as Cath Harmer, Celso Arango, and Livia De Picker also contributed to the programme and gave outstanding presentations. You can find the full programme here.
There will be a summary paper of the meeting, allowing those who couldn’t join to catch up on the key developments; we’ll keep you posted! Just in time, the report of the 2025 meeting has been published in ECNP's journal European Neuropsychopharmacology (ENP) and can be found here.
I wish you all a successful, healthy, and happy 2026!
Take care and all the best, |
As ever, feel free to contact me by reply e-mail.
Andreas Reif
ECNP President |
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