Zvi D. Gellis, PhD
Associate ProfessorCo-Director of the PAC Program
3701 Locust Walk, Caster Building
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6214
215.746.5487 (phone); 215.573.2099 (fax)
zgellis@sp2.upenn.edu
Dr. Gellis is the director of the Center for Mental Health & Aging. The Center conducts rigorous applied research on geriatric mental health services for older persons in home healthcare and behavioral health settings, and provides training in cognitive behavioral interventions for depression.
- Dr. Gellis is a Hartford Geriatric Social Work Faculty Scholar and an expert in community-based geriatric mental health services.
- His research has focused on late life depression and integrated mental health service delivery for community-based medically ill older adults.
- Dr. Gellis co-directs the Penn Aging Concentration, an academic initiative that addresses the critical need in the U.S. for professionally-trained geriatric social workers. The program is part of the Geriatric Social Work Initiative and funded by the John A. Hartford Foundation.
- Most recently, Dr. Gellis served as the national Chair of the Geriatric Mental Health Research Reviews committee at the Council on Social Work Education. Dr. Gellis and co-author Dr. McCracken, developed a series of state-of-the art curriculum modules used in social work schools nationally. Click here to view the modules.
- Dr. Gellis served on the New York State’s Interagency Planning Council for Geriatric Mental Health Services, and provides training in depression interventions to geriatric mental health demonstration projects across the state.
- Dr. Gellis is an expert trainer in Problem Solving Therapy (PST), an evidence-based treatment for depression. Dr. Gellis completed several clinical intervention studies examining the effectiveness of PST for depression in medically ill homecare elderly (Gellis et al, 2007; Gellis et al, 2008; Gellis & Bruce, 2010; Gellis & Nezu, 2011).
- Dr. Gellis has been the recipient of numerous awards including a Visiting Professor Fellowship in South Korea, Fellowships at the National Heart, Lung, & Blood Institute and the National Institute on Aging. He has been recognized for his research on late life depression at the International Social Work in Health and Mental Health Conference in China.
- Dr. Gellis (c-author) and Dr. Roberta Sands have published Clinical social work in behavioral mental health: An evidenced-based approach, (2012), (3rd edition). Pearson, Allyn & Bacon.
