The Guze Symposium

Samuel B. Guze, MD, was born in New York City, New York on October 18, 1923 to parents who immigrated to the United States from Ukraine.   Both of Dr. Guze's parents were tremendously committed to education.   Dr. Guze became an excellent student and earned admittance into the competitive honors school, Townsend Harris Hall, from which he graduated at the age of 15. Dr. Guze was a pioneer in the field of alcoholism research.   He joined the Washington University School of Medicine faculty in 1951, served as vice chancellor and president of the Medical Center from 1971 to 1989, and headed the Department of Psychiatry from 1975 to 1989 and again from 1993 to 1997.   

Dr. Guze's psychiatric research studies, considered novel in the mid-1950's, developed a series of ground-breaking clinical, follow-up and family studies in alcoholism, criminality, personality disorders and genetics in the Department of Psychiatry at Washington University School of Medicine.   His legacy is evident today in studies like Collaborative Study on the Genetics of Alcoholism (COGA) and in the Missouri Alcoholism Research Center. Dr. Guze had a profound effect overall on the field of Psychiatry as well as on the individuals he interacted with on a professional and personal basis.   His influence and contributions will continue and are exhibited through the advances of those he mentored.

Past Guze Symposia

Seventh Annua Symposium, February 15, 2007: "Alcohol Use Across the Lifespan"

Sixth Annual Symposium, March 2, 2006: "Alcohol and Tobacco Dependence:   from Bench

to Bedside"

Fifth Annual Symposium, February 17, 2005: "Alcoholism and Comorbidity"

Fourth Annual Symposium, February 19, 2004: "Alcoholism and the Latest Genetics & Neuroscience Findings"

Third Annual Symposium, February 28, 2003: "Drinking and the High School Student"

Second Annual Symposium, March 2, 2002: "The Challenges of College-Age Drinking"