Paula Riggs Editor & Author

Paula Riggs

University of Colorado, School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry

University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus 

Aurora

Colorado, USA

Thida Thant

University of Colorado, School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry

University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus 

Aurora

Colorado, USA

Bios: 

Paula Riggs, MD is Professor and Vice-Chair of Faculty Affairs in the Department of Psychiatry, University of Colorado School of Medicine. As the Director of the Division of Addiction Science, Prevention, and Treatment Dependence, she oversees a broad range of NIH-funded addiction research projects. Dr. Riggs is also well known for her research in adolescents with co-occurring psychiatric and substance use disorders. Her research informed the development of Encompass--one of the first truly integrated, evidence-based mental health/substance treatment interventions for adolescents and young adults. 

Dr. Thida Thant is a faculty psychiatrist at the University of Colorado Department of Psychiatry and is the Director of the Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry Service and the Psychiatric Consultation for the Medically Complex clinic. She graduated with a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Plan II Honors from the University of Texas in Austin, attended the University of Texas Medical School in Houston and completed her psychiatry residency and consultation-liaison fellowship at the University of Colorado. Her professional interests include cannabis and its impact on psychiatric practice, cannabis-related curricula in medical education and comprehensive mental health care for medically and neurologically complex patients, with a more recent focus on long-haul COVID. She has written about cannabis and psychiatric care in books such as Marijuana and Mental Health and Cannabis in Medicine and has developed and published an AAMC MedEdPortal curriculum entitled "What You Need to Know About Cannabis: An Evidence-Based Crash Course for Mental Health Trainees." In her spare time, she enjoys cycling, skiing, paddleboarding and hanging with her pups Wall-E and Reba.