WASHINGTON — Antonio Puente, PhD, professor of psychology at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington, has been elected 2017 president of the American Psychological Association. He will serve as APA’s president-elect in 2016.
Puente is also the founder and co-director of the Cape Fear Clinic, a bilingual mental health clinic for the poor and uninsured and holds appointments as a visiting professor at the Universidad de Granada, Spain, University of California, Los Angeles and the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.
During his presidency one of Puente’s priorities will be to continue the focus on integrating psychology into comprehensive healthcare.
“Psychology is the only viable discipline in position to provide an integrative care model wherein all health care disciplines collaborate to produce better outcomes at lower costs,” said Puente. “The initial step is to erase the divide between physical and mental health, all the while buttressing our efforts in mental health. Psychology will be the catalyst for integrative healthcare.”
Puente is a past-president of the North Carolina Psychological Association, North Carolina Psychological Foundation, National Academy of Neuropsychology, Society for Clinical Neuropsychology and Hispanic Neuropsychological Society.
A member of APA since 1979, Puente has served two terms as the APA council representative for the Society for Clinical Neuropsychology. He has chaired the Psychology Academy of the National Academies of Practice and several APA boards and committees ranging from the Board of Convention Affairs to the Committee on Psychological Tests and Assessment. He served on the Joint Committee for the Revision of the Standards for Educational and Psychological Testing. Puente was APA’s representative to the American Medical Association’s Current Procedural Terminology panel from 1993 to 2008 and has served on the Center for Medicare and Medicaid’s Medicare Coverage Advisory Committee.
Puente was born in Cuba and received his PhD from the University of Georgia.
The American Psychological Association, in Washington, D.C., is the largest scientific and professional organization representing psychology in the United States. APA's membership includes more than 122,500 researchers, educators, clinicians, consultants and students. Through its divisions in 54 subfields of psychology and affiliations with 60 state, territorial and Canadian provincial associations, APA works to advance the creation, communication and application of psychological knowledge to benefit society and improve people's lives.