Introduction
Dear colleagues, first of all, I would like to extend my warm and sincere greetings!
Neuropsychiatric disorders have become a major disabling disease worldwide, and also constitute a major burden of disease in Asian area. With the development and progress of new technologies, new therapeutic drugs and management programs have been introduced, and our treatment notion and management programs have also been continuously improved to help those with various mental disorders. Since the establishment in 2008, the Asian Academy of Neuropsychopharmacology (AsCNP) has been stand on “encouraging research and collaboration to promote the communication of ideas in convergent disciplines of neuropsychopharmacology in Asia”. Under encourage of this mission, Asian colleagues have been involved actively in developing new pharmacotherapies, and providing continuing education and training opportunities for psychiatrists and empower patients and families with professional knowledge.
AsCNP adheres to the comprehension, realism and innovation, works together with our international colleagues. At present, AsCNP has 8 social members and 58 individual/counterpart members in 17 countries/regions, and more than 3400 members. The conference is held every two years. They are, the first conference, in Kyoto, Japan (2009), the second in Seoul, South Korea (2011), the third in Beijing, China (2013), the forth in Taipei, Taiwan (2015), the fifth in Bali, Indonesia (2017), the sixth in Fukuoka, Japan (2019) and the seventh in Singapore (2021). All these conferences have been very successful and fruitful. Under the leadership of the presidents and executive committees of AsCNP, the previous conferences and the Institute have achieved unprecedented development.
In the past three years, the global COVID-19 epidemic has changed the spectrum of neuropsychiatric diseases, increased the number of people suffering from depression and anxiety disorders, and brought greater challenges to our professional services. Now we are in 2023, the global prevalence of the COVID-19 epidemic has gone. We should actively carry out more research to accumulate evidence, and exchange research findings improving the treatment qualities for patients with mental disorders and making people live a healthy and happy life. In 2023, the 8th AsCNP is coming, it will be held in Xi'an, China, on September 22-24, 2023. Xi'an is a fascinating historical city, and we sincerely invite you to come.
Tianmei Si
January, 2023