Professor David A Alexander MA(Hons), C.Psychol, PhD, FBPS, FRSM, (Hon)FRCPsych
Professor David A Alexander is a graduate of the Universities of St Andrews and Dundee, and has undergone specialist postgraduate training at the Universities of Aberdeen and Birmingham and at the FBI Academy, USA.
He is the former Director of the Aberdeen Centre for Trauma Research and Professor of Mental Health in the Faculty of Health and Social Care. He was leader of the psychiatric team following the Piper Alpha disaster in 1988. Since then, he has dealt with survivors, rescuers and other helpers caught up in the Lockerbie terrorist incident, Estonia ferry disaster, and air crash in Antarctica, the Balkans War, the Ural’s train disaster in Russia, and the Chinook and Sikorsky helicopter crashes. Following the Nairobi terrorist bombing he was requested by the Royal College of Psychiatrists to be the specialist adviser to the Kenya Medical Association. In June, 2004, he conducted a review of the Iraq psychiatric services on behalf of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and conducted a similar exercise in Sri Lanka following the tsunami disaster. In January, 2006, he was invited out to Pakistan as an Adviser following the October, 2005 earthquake. Most recently, he was appointed to the Joint Medical Committee of NATO and the UK Scientific Advisory Group for Pandemic Influenza.
He is an adviser to the Scottish Police Service on the management of trauma and hostage negotiation. He is a Visiting Lecturer at the Scottish Police College, and has been a Guest Lecturer at the FBI Academy and the Russian School of Militia. He has been a Visiting Professor at Universities in Russia, the West Indies, Spain, Croatia, the USA and the Republic of South Africa (where he was also invited in 2001 as the “Distinguished Trauma Visitor”).
He is a Fellow of the British Psychological Society and the Royal Society of Medicine and an Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists.
