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Research Interests

 

Dr. Parry's research and clinical background is in women’s mood disorders related to the reproductive cycle, and in chronobiology. With regard to her background in women’s mood disorders, as a medical student, she published a manuscript on the biologic basis of oral contraceptive-induced depressions (Mentor: A. John Rush, M.D.); as a psychiatric resident at the University of California, Los Angeles, she initiated, and subsequently published, a study on cerebrospinal fluid and endocrine measures in Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder-PMDD (Mentor: Robert Gerner, M.D.).

Dr. Parry continued her studies of women’s mood disorders at the NIH, expanding into its chronobiological aspects, and for the last 32 years since coming to UCSD, she has extended the endocrine and chronobiological investigations in PMDD to other depressive disorders related to the reproductive cycle in women (pregnancy, postpartum, menopause). With regard to chronobiology, Dr. Parry did a research fellowship in Clinical Chronobiology at the National Institute of Mental Health (Mentors: Frederick K. Goodwin, M.D., Thomas A. Wehr, M.D. and Norman E. Rosenthal, M.D.), where as a clinical research associate she helped to implement studies primarily of melatonin circadian rhythms and of sleep and light therapies in mood disorders (rapid cycling bipolar illness and seasonal affective disorder) and initiated her own studies on melatonin circadian rhythms, sleep and light therapies in PMDD.

Since joining the faculty in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) in 1985, Dr. Parry has extended the studies of melatonin and other hormones (cortisol, thyroid, prolactin, estradiol, progesterone, gonadotrophins) and of sleep and light therapies to not only PMDD, but also to pregnancy, postpartum and menopausal depressive disorders (Collaborators: J. Christian Gillin, M.D., Daniel F. Kripke, M.D., Richard L. Hauger, M.D., Jeffrey A. Elliott, Ph.D., Sonia Ancoli-Israel, Ph.D.). Dr. Parry served on the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM-III-R and DSM-IV committees to develop diagnostic criteria for PMDD (and as a consultant for postpartum mood disorders), the Advisory Panel for the Surgeon General’s Women’s Mental Health Project, the NIH Office of Research for Women’s Health: Planning the Women’s Health Agenda for the 21st Century and the Executive Board of the Marce’ Society, The International Society for the Study and Treatment of Mental Illness during Childbearing.

In these areas pertaining to the chronobiology of women’s mood disorders, she has published over 285 publications, maintained a consistent level of funding support through primarily NIH and other sources as PI, served as a reviewer on study sections, special emphasis panels, stimulus package grant applications and Data and Safety Monitoring Boards, and been on the editorial boards of multiple journals including the American Journal of Psychiatry, the Journal of Biological Rhythms, the International Journal of Endocrinology and Postpartum Equilibria, and Journal of Postpartum Depression Research.

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