Kenneth Busch, MD

Why Dr. Busch was chosen:
Dr. Busch’s contributions to IPS have been extraordinary every year. This year we pause to honor him for the many ways he supports Illinois psychiatrists and our patients. His leadership in government affairs and understanding of political processes has been invaluable and has helped IPS over several decades to protect safe prescribing laws in Illinois. He promotes the collaborative care model to expand access to psychiatric care in Illinois and closely follows laws affecting our practice and patient safety. Dr. Busch is a generous and enthusiastic mentor who fosters collegial relations among members and helps others to cultivate relationships with legislators. Dr. Busch has been a leader in the APA Assembly for many years and served as Area IV Representative to the Executive Council of the APA Assembly. Not surprisingly, Dr. Busch is also active in numerous allied medical organizations, such as the American Medical Association, the Illinois State Medical Society, the World Psychiatric Society, and others. We are indebted to him for his many avenues of leadership and friendship to IPS.

Bio: Dr. Busch is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and Illinois Psychiatric Society. Early in his career Dr. Busch was interested in psychoanalysis and studied at the Hampstead Clinic in London with Anna Freud.

He has been in clinical practice for a long time and has served as a health care consultant to various facilities on state and national levels. Interested in public policy Dr. Busch worked in mid-career as a Consultant to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department of State.

Dr. Busch has served in numerous roles in IPS and APA. He currently serves as Co-Chair of the IPS Government Affairs Committee and Consultant on the APA Scientific Program Committee. 

Dr. Busch previously served in leadership capacity in Area 4 of the APA Assembly. In this role he mentored many of his colleagues on the importance of legislative advocacy with state policymakers and Members of Congress. He helped facilitate relationship building with IPS and Members of the Illinois Congressional Delegation.

His research interests have focused on terrorism, national security, and youth violence. He has published widely and given many presentations on these topics.

It is a particular privilege and honor to receive this award from IPS. Dr. Busch is very grateful to his colleagues and staff for having the opportunity to serve IPS and APA and improve the quality of care for our patients. 

Roxanna De La Torre, MD

Why Dr. De La Torre was chosen:
Regarded by peers and supervisors as dedicated, with a passion for learning and the utmost commitment to patients, Dr. De La Torre is an active team member and role model to others. This year, she was the coinvestigator for two studies including a clinical trial on novel ADHD intervention to improve access to care. She has presented a session nationally at the American Psychiatric Association meeting in 2024 and internationally via a poster presentation at the International Association for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Allied Professions where she won best poster in 2024. Some of her other recent presentations topics include: Nontraditional Career Paths in Medicine, Neurobiology of Addiction, and training for educators statewide on Social-Emotional Competence & Student and Staff Mental Health.

Bio: Dr. Roxanna De La Torre completed her undergraduate education at DePaul University. She went on to receive her medical degree from St. George’s University and completed residency at SUNY Downstate Health Sciences University in Brooklyn, where she served as chief resident. In residency, she co-led the development of a mentorship program connecting resident physicians with middle/high school/early college students of underrepresented minorities from Central Brooklyn for individual and group mentorship.

During residency, Dr. De La Torre also completed a two-year graduate training program in Adult Psychodynamic Psychotherapy, became certified to perform ECT at Bellevue Hospital in Manhattan. During her Child and Adolescent Psychiatry fellowship at Lurie Children’s Hospital, Dr. De La Torre gave oral presentations at the APA, served as a panel discussant on therapeutic alliance in psychosis, and contributed to youth and educator programs through the Center for Childhood Resilience and the REACH Initiative. She presented on addiction neurobiology, nontraditional medical careers, and social-emotional competence in schools. She co-authored a first-place poster on Catatonia vs. Down Syndrome Regression at IACAPAP and participated in research on ADHD engagement and health equity for Latinx youth with eating disorders.

Dr. De La Torre recently completed her fellowship and will continue at Lurie Children’s as an outpatient child psychiatrist.

Sumbul Liaqat, MD

Why Dr. Liaqat was chosen:
Besides being an exceptional clinician and an amazing human being, Dr. Liaqat has built an exceptional research portfolio, especially for only being in her second year of residency. As a PGY I, she presented a poster at the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP) annual conference. As a PGY II, she presented a poster at the American Psychiatric Association annual conference, five presentations/posters at the International Society of Addiction Medicine annual conference in Germany, three poster presentations at the European Congress of Psychiatry in Spain, submitted abstracts for three posters for this year's AACAP in Chicago, as well as also presenting a poster at Rush.

Bio: Dr. Sumbul Liaqat is a PGY-3 psychiatry resident at Rush University Medical Center. She graduated from King Edward Medical University in Pakistan and began her career researching the intergenerational impact of Adverse Childhood Experiences on maternal and child mental health, with findings presented at international conferences including the World Psychiatric Association and AACAP. She then came to the U.S and worked as a Psychiatry Research Assistant and presented at various national and international conferences.

In her PGY-1, she presented her academic work on reading disabilities and adverse childhood experiences at AACAP. In her PGY-2, she continues to bridge research, advocacy, and clinical care and presented multiple posters in APA, Psychiatry Update, EPA, and ISAM conferences. As a PGY-3, she plays a central role in “Read to Heal,” a literacy and mental health program for underserved children at RUSH. She currently leads a quality improvement project to enhance suicide risk assessment for intoxicated patients in the emergency department.

Her leadership extends beyond research and clinical excellence; she has mentored medical students and international graduates. She aspires to a career in child and adolescent psychiatry, integrating trauma-informed care, advocacy, and innovative clinical solutions.

Ayanah Dowdye

Why Ayanah was chosen:
Ayanah is an exceptional M4 student who has been heavily involved in psychiatric research & service, while maintaining academic excellence. Accomplishments for her work focused on health equity & community engagement include: being awarded a Chicago-area Schweitzer Service Fellowship and being selected as a Health Equity Research Fellow at Rush. Ayanah is also heavily involved in research on the intersection of technology & child and adolescent mental health, as well as leading Rush's Teen Mental Health group.

Bio: Ayanah is an M4 at Rush with a deep commitment to mental health equity in underserved communities. She is strongly considering a career in child and adolescent psychiatry, with special interests in mood disorders and PTSD as they relate to community trauma. Her clinical exposure to alternative treatment modalities, including neuromodulation and clinical research trials utilizing psilocybin and other novel therapies, fuels her excitement about the evolving frontiers of psychiatry.

At Rush, she helps lead a teen mental health group and was awarded the Schweitzer Fellowship to develop a curriculum for an after-school program providing mental health workshops for high school–aged young women. Ayanah looks forward to a career that integrates innovative treatments with a deep understanding of the social and cultural forces shaping mental health.

Senada Bajmakovic Kacila, MD

Why Dr. Bajmakovic Kacila was chosen:
Dr. Kacila embodies the essence of academic leadership, clinical excellence, and personal investment in the growth of psychiatric residents. She has consistently gone above and beyond to cultivate a nurturing and intellectually stimulating environment that empowers trainees to evolve into thoughtful, empathetic, and evidence-based practitioners. Her mentorship is both rigorous and compassionate—whether she’s guiding residents through complex diagnostic challenges, offering career advice, or creating innovative curricula that reflect both the latest psychiatric research and the realities of clinical practice. Dr. Kacila has introduced interdisciplinary seminars, hands-on supervision models, and reflective learning sessions that have profoundly transformed resident education. Residents frequently describe her as the cornerstone of their professional development, citing her accessibility, advocacy, and unwavering belief in each trainee’s potential. Her passion for education is matched only by her deep empathy and commitment to patient care—qualities that illuminate every lecture, supervision session, and clinical decision. The ripple effect of her dedication is tangible—not only in the success of individual residents, but in the broader culture of integrity, excellence, and compassion she’s nurtured within the institution.

Bio: Senada Bajmakovic-Kacila finished medical school at the University of Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina, then completed her residency training program at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY. She subsequently worked at the Zucker Hillside Hospital in Glen Oaks, NY for 17 years where she was actively involved in all aspects of teaching and supervising residents and medical students. Dr. Bajmakovic-Kacila moved to Chicago in 2014 and has been working at Rush University Medical Center as an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry ever since.  

 Her journey at Rush started with supervising residents at the adult outpatient clinic. The following year, she became Medical Director of the clinic.  Two years later, she was also appointed Psychiatry Residency Program Director due to her extraordinary investment and passion for medical education. In these two roles, she has made marked improvements in the functioning of the outpatient clinic as well as significantly enhancing the quality of the residency program. Because of her influence, Rush residents now present their work at international as well as local and national conferences. As a result of her achievements, she was appointed Vice Chair for Education at the Rush Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences in 2023. This is the third leadership position that she currently holds at Rush.

Krishna Taneja, MD, MBA

Why Dr. Taneja was chosen:
Dr. Taneja has contributed significantly to the Springfield community. She is a member of the Massey Commission's Integrated Mental Health Services and Emergency Response Workgroup. The Massey Commission was established in response to the tragic killing of Sonya Massey by a former county deputy in July 2024. She also launched THRIVE (Trauma Healing and Resilience in Volatile Environments), a pilot program at SIU establishing the region's first comprehensive trauma-informed crisis response system.

Bio: Dr. Krishna Taneja is an Integrative Psychiatrist, Mind-Body Medicine Expert dedicated to fostering resilient communities by addressing population-wide trauma. She is spearheading Integrative Medicine Education at Southern Illinois University. During her medical education in Ukraine, she led government training programs and educational reforms for the country’s EU integration, forging her commitment to systemic healthcare change.

As Trauma Relief and Wellness Program Manager at the Center for Mind-Body Medicine, she led two statewide initiatives, delivering evidence-based, trauma-informed support to schools, healthcare systems, and first responders. At SIU, she launched THRIVE (Trauma Healing and Resilience in Volatile Environments), a multidisciplinary coalition of healthcare systems and community partners establishing the region’s first pilot crisis-response system and implements resilience programs tackling housing, food security, and care-access barriers —laying the groundwork for statewide expansion.

Dr. Taneja serves on the Sonya Massey Commission’s Mental Health and Emergency Response Workgroup, contributing policy recommendations that improve equity, coordination, and access to mental healthcare. Her collaborative work with South Asian immigrant and refugee communities, and underserved populations in India, underscore her global vision for resilience.

Through pioneering programs, policy advocacy, and hands-on leadership, Dr. Taneja has transformed community resilience and healing—advancing trauma-informed care at local, state, and international levels.

Lisa Rosenthal, MD, FACLP, DFAPA

Why Dr. Rosenthal was chosen:
Dr. Rosenthal is the director of a Collaborative Care Program supporting population-based screening for depression and anxiety serving more than 370,000 Primary Care patients throughout the Northwestern Medicine healthcare system. She is the Medical Director and PI of the Northwestern Medicine - West Health Accelerator, a funded, multi-year initiative to help transform mental health care by delivering and studying efficient, effective, and equitable integrated psychiatric programs. The collaboration builds upon the successes of the Northwestern Medicine Collaborative Behavioral Health Program (CBHP), which has been integrating psychiatric services into Northwestern Medicine primary care sites since 2018. She has worked closely with IPS to help create the Illinois Collaborative Care Model Workgroup and offered valuable insight into her real-world experience with this model and other ways of using integrated care in order to expand the mental health care access across the state.

Bio: Dr Lisa J. Rosenthal is the Chief of the Division of Consultation Psychiatry and Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. She is also the Director of the Northwestern University Fellowship in Consultation Liaison Psychiatry. Her academic focus is on medical care of patients with severe mental illness, delirium, hospital violence, and the collaborative care model. She is a distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association, a Fellow of the Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry (ACLP), and a Board Member of the ACLP. Prior to becoming a physician she worked in several community-based jobs helping people with severe psychiatric illnesses and now focuses on integrated care through the medical continuum.

Dr. Rosenthal is the director of a Collaborative Care Program supporting population-based screening for depression and anxiety serving more than 370,000 Primary Care patients throughout the Northwestern Medicine healthcare system. She is the Medical Director and PI of the Northwestern Medicine - West Health Accelerator, a funded, multi-year initiative to help transform mental health care by delivering and studying efficient, effective, and equitable integrated psychiatric programs. The collaboration builds upon the successes of the Northwestern Medicine Collaborative Behavioral Health Program (CBHP), which has been integrating psychiatric services into Northwestern Medicine primary care sites since 2018. 

Sudhakar Shenoy, MD

Why Dr. Shenoy was chosen:
Dr. Shenoy shows unwavering commitment to patient care. Despite facing numerous systemic barriers, he consistently puts patients first. His compassion, clinical excellence, and integrity speak volumes. Despite balancing his leadership roles in the American Psychiatric Association, the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, The Illinois Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and the Illinois Psychiatric Society., he remains grounded in the core values of our profession, which is delivering care with empathy, resilience, and purpose.

Bio: Sudhakar Shenoy, MD, FAPA earned his medical degree from Bangalore Medical College and Research Institute, where he graduated as valedictorian. He completed his psychiatry residency and child and adolescent psychiatry fellowship at the Southern Illinois University School of Medicine in Springfield, Illinois. He is board-certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (ABPN) in both psychiatry and the subspecialty of child and adolescent psychiatry.

Before residency, Dr. Shenoy participated in research training at Harvard Medical School, Virginia Commonwealth University–Medical College of Virginia, and the National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences (NIMHANS) in India.

Dr. Shenoy’s journey to medicine was shaped by a personal experience: as a child, he survived a life-threatening accident that required multiple surgeries. The scarcity of medical resources in India initially made it difficult to access timely care, but the compassion and skill of the physicians who ultimately treated him left a lasting impression. This experience remains a driving force behind his commitment to providing exceptional care for his patients. As an International Medical Graduate (IMG), Dr. Shenoy is deeply committed to serving medically underserved areas (MUAs) and health professional shortage areas (HPSAs). 

He is the founder and Medical Director of Downtown Psychiatry Chicago, a private practice clinic in the heart of Chicago. Clinically, he is passionate about understanding the brain’s complexities and tailoring treatments that help patients thrive.

Dr. Shenoy is also a dedicated advocate for psychiatry and patient care. He currently serves as the Early Career Psychiatrist Trustee-at-Large on the American Psychiatric Association’s Board of Trustees, a nationally elected position he will hold for a three-year term.

Karen Pierce, MD, DLFAACAP, DLAPA

Why Dr. Pierce was chosen:
Dr. Pierce immediately comes to mind when her peers and friends think of advocacy. She is a leader at the national and local level and a role model and inspiration to many. In her time advocating for the best interest of patients, she shares her years of experience and serves as an educator and team member, speaking up to help elevate the voice of psychiatrists. She aims to improve the mental health system and guides psychiatrists of all levels of experience in their advocacy journey. She passionately advocates on Children’s Mental Health and the practice of psychiatry on both a federal and state level. She has been active as an advocate and leadership through IPS, AACAP, ICCAP, IPS and AMA. She teaches and trains her colleagues and students in the art of advocacy both at the local and national level. In addition to Children’s Mental Health, she advocates for PANCAN, the Long Covid Research, and a woman’s rights to comprehensive medical care.

Bio: Karen Pierce is honored to receive the IPS Outstanding Achievement in Advocacy Award.  She passionately advocates on Children’s Mental Health and the practice of psychiatry on both a federal and state level. She has been active as an advocate through IPS, AACAP, Illinois AACAP, APA and AMA.  She teaches and trains her colleagues and students in the art of advocacy both a local and national level.  She is a member on the government relations council of the American Psychiatric Association (CAGR), is past co-chair of the Advocacy Committee of the American Association of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP), Past delegate to the AMA’s House of Delegates, Chair of Advocacy on the Illinois Council of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and on the Government Affairs committee at Illinois Psychiatric Society.  In addition to Children’s Mental Health, she advocates for PANCAN, the Long Covid Research, and a woman’s rights to comprehensive medical care.

Dr. Karen Pierce is a Child, Adolescent, and Adult Psychiatrist currently in Private Practice and Clinical Associate Professor of Child Psychiatry at Northwestern University.

Dr. Karen Pierce received her M.D. degree from the University of Illinois and completed her residency in adult, adolescent, and child psychiatry at the University of Michigan.

Olusola Ajilore, MD, PHD

Why Dr. Ajilore was chosen:
Dr. Ajilore is a nationally recognized leader in computational psychiatry whose pioneering work integrates neuroimaging, machine learning, and digital technology to advance the understanding and treatment of mood disorders. As the Center for Depression Research Professor of Psychiatry at UIC, his research has transformed how we conceptualize brain connectivity and emotion regulation in depression and aging populations. Dr. Ajilore has received sustained federal research funding.

Bio: Dr. Ajilore is the Center for Depression and Resilience Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Illinois-Chicago. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard University with a degree in biology. Dr. Ajilore did his MD/PhD degree at Stanford University where he studied the negative effects of stress hormones on the brain. His lab currently uses computational neuroimaging techniques and digital biomarkers to better track and treat neuropsychiatric disorders.

Dr. Ajilore is also serves as the Associate Head for Faculty Development, the director the Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program and as a member of the National Advisory Mental Health Council for NIMH.

Jennifer Thomas, MD 

Why Dr. Thomas was chosen:
Dr. Thomas has been an amazing collaborator, lending her expertise in collaborative care to IPS' efforts to increase the use of the collaborative care model throughout the state of Illinois. She has been a leader and assisted in building connections to other professional organizations, which has been crucial in the successful creation of the Illinois Collaborative Care Model Workgroup. Her generosity with her knowledge and time led to the Workgroup coalescing quickly and effectively. IPS is fortunate to have Dr. Thomas as a partner in its efforts.

Bio: Dr. Jennifer Thomas, MD, FASAM is board-certified in family medicine and addiction physician and currently serves as Medical Director of Integrated Behavioral Health at Morris Hospital in Morris, IL.

Dr. Thomas practices in a community-based, rural setting and is passionate about integrating behavioral health services into primary care. She completed the 2018 University of California Irvine Train New Trainers Primary Care Psychiatry Fellowship. As a leader in developing partnerships between academic research settings and community-based providers, Dr. Thomas works closely as an Affiliate Trainer with the University of Washington AIMS Center. As an advocate for increasing access to medication for Opioid Use Disorder, particularly in rural settings, Dr. Thomas was part of an inaugural cohort of 5 IL physicians supported by ISAM to become board certified in Addiction Medicine through the ABPM Practice Pathway.

Dr. Thomas serves as the National Medical Co-Director for Integrated Care at the Collaborative Family Healthcare Association. Dr. Thomas is also a Senior Fellow for Health System Integration at the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute.