A. Thomas McLellan, Ph.D., is a Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania and co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of the Treatment Research Institute (TRI), a not-for-profit research and development institute in Philadelphia.
McLellan is nationally and internationally recognized for his more than 30 years of research in the field of substance abuse. In 1991, he co-founded TRI as an independent, not-for-profit institute dedicated to conveying the results of research to policymakers, practitioners, prevention organizations and the families of those affected by substance abuse.
McLellan has fostered understanding of addiction as a chronic illness and the operative ingredients of effective treatment, including continuous monitoring and management. He was one of the first in the field to document the problems confronting the “business” of the nation’s substance abuse treatment system and, with the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, is leading a first-of-its kind partnership between scientists and industry specialists to adapt and apply lessons learned from other problem-plagued industries.
His many other accomplishments include educating doctors in mainstream medical health care to recognize and respond to symptoms of alcohol and drug use; removing regulatory impediments to quality care in treatment; and implanting evidence-based treatment practices for such diverse populations as substance abusing offenders and the families and significant others of substance abuse patients. For parents who suspect or are confronting drug use in their children, McLellan has teamed with the Partnership for a Drug Free America to convey parent-friendly, science-based information and tools. Under McLellan, TRI was one of the first organizations in the nation to warn of the dangers of teen access to illicit drugs via the Internet.
McLellan emerged on the national scene in the 1980s when he was principal developer of the Addiction Severity Index (ASI) and the Treatment Services Review (TSR), tools that revolutionized the substance abuse field and became some of the most widely used instruments of their kind in the world.
He has published more than 400 articles and chapters on addiction research and serves as Editor in Chief of the Journal of Substance Abuse Treatment. He serves on the editorial boards and as a reviewer of numerous medical and scientific journals.
He has served as an advisor to many government and nonprofit scientific organizations, including the Office of National Drug Control Policy, Research and Evaluation; the National Practice Laboratory of the American Psychiatric Association, the Swiss National Science Foundation, the World Health Organization, and the Greek government.
Among McLellan's honors and awards are the Life Achievement Award of the American Society of Addiction Medicine in 2003 and the 2002 award for Distinguished Contribution in Addiction Medicine from the Swedish Medical Association. In 2003 he received the prestigious Okey Honorary Lecture Award by the British Medical Society; in 2004 was named Innovator of the Year by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; and in 2006 earned the John P. McGovern Award for “significant impact on the field of alcohol and drug abuse.”
McLellan received his B.A. from Colgate University and his M.S. and Ph.D. from Bryn Mawr College. He received postgraduate training in psychology at Oxford University in England.
