Dr. Buysse has over 25 years of experience in sleep medicine research. His main areas of focus include sleep assessment and patient-reported outcomes; evaluation and treatment of insomnia; and sleep in aging. He has also investigated sleep in mood disorders, and the interaction between sleep and circadian physiology. This research uses a variety of techniques such as self-report, actigraphy, home and laboratory-based polysomnography, laboratory-based circadian assessments, and functional imaging studies. Dr. Buysse has also conducted clinical trials of behavioral treatment for insomnia.
Dr. Buysse has a long-standing record of teaching and mentoring. He has mentored (or is currently mentoring) 21 post-doctoral fellows, 11 of these as primary research mentor. He has also mentored 12 undergraduate or medical students on research electives. Nine of Dr. Buysse’s previous post-docs have received K awards, eight have obtained NIH R-series funding, and four are still in training. Dr. Buysse is Program Director of an NHLBI-funded T32 program, “Translational Research Training in Sleep Medicine” (HL082610-08), and on the training faculty of two other T32 programs and the institutional KL2 program through the Clinical and Translational Science Institute. Of 8 alumni of the sleep medicine T32, 5 have received K awards. Dr. Buysse is the prior recipient of a K24 award.
Dr. Buysse has served in national and local leadership positions. He is Past President of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, a former member of the Board of Directors of the Society of Behavioral Sleep Medicine, and Chair of the Sleep Research Network. He has served as Chair of the Biobehavioral Mechanisms of Stress and Health (MESH) study section at NIH, and has served on several NIH panels, including the Program Committee for the NIH State-of-the-Science Conference on the Manifestations and Management of Chronic Insomnia in Adults. Dr. Buysse is Deputy Editor of the journal SLEEP, and has served as Deputy Editor of Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, and Associate Editor of Behavioral Sleep Medicine. At the University of Pittsburgh, he served as Director of the Neuroscience Clinical and Translational Research Center, a component of our GCRC then CTSI, for nearly 20 years. He is Co-Chair of the Department of Psychiatry Research Review Committee, and Chair of the K Award Review Program.
- BA, University of Michigan, 1981
- MD, University of Michigan, 1983
- Postdoctoral Fellowship, University of Pittsburgh, 1987-1989
Education & Training
Levenson JC, Kay DB, Buysse DJ. The pathophysiology of insomnia. Chest 147(4): 1179-1192, 2015. PMCID: PMC4388122
Kay DB, Buysse DJ, Germain A, Hall MH, Monk TH. Subjective-objective sleep discrepancy among older adults: Associations with insomnia diagnosis and insomnia treatment. Journal of Sleep Research 24(1):32-39, 2015. PMCID: PMC474029
Buysse DJ. Sleep health: Can we define it? Does it matter? Sleep, 37(1):9-17, 2014. PMCID: PMC3902880
Buysse DJ. Insomnia. JAMA-Journal of the American Medical Association, 309(7):706-716, 2013. PMCID: PMC3632369
Yu L, Buysse DJ, Germain A, Moul DE, Stover A, Dodds NE, Johnston KL, Pilkonis PA. Development of short forms from PROMISTM Sleep Disturbance and Sleep-Related Impairment Item Banks. Behavioral Medicine, 10(1): 6-24, 2012. PMCID: PMC3261577
Buysse DJ, Germain A, Hall M, Monk TH, Nofzinger EA. A neurobiological model of insomnia. Drug Discovery Today: Disease Models, 8(4): 129-137, 2011. PMCID: PMC3212043.
Buysse DJ, Germain A, Moul DE, Franzen PL, Brar LK, Fletcher ME, Begley A, Houck PR, Mazumdar S, Reynolds CF, Monk TH. Efficacy of brief behavioral treatment for chronic insomnia in older adults. Archives of Internal Medicine, 171(10):887-895, 2011. PMCID: PMC3101289
Buysse DJ, Yu L, Moul DE, Germain A, Stover A, Dodds NE, Johnston KL, Shablesky-Cade MA, Pilkonis PA. Development and validation of patient-reported outcome measures for sleep disturbance and sleep-related impairments. Sleep, 33(6):781-92, 2010. PMCID: PMC2880437
Buysse DJ, Angst J, Gamma A, Ajdacic V, Eich D, Rossler W. Prevalence, course and comorbidity of insomnia and depression in young adults. Sleep, 31(4):473-80, 2008. PMCID: PMC2279748
Nofzinger EA, Nissen C, Germain A, Moul D, Hall M, Price JC, Miewald JM, Buysse DJ. Regional cerebral metabolic correlates of WASO during sleep in insomnia. Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 2(3):316-22, 2006.
Nofzinger EA, Buysse DJ, Germain A, Price JC, Miewald JM, Kupfer DJ. Functional neuroimaging evidence of hyperarousal in insomnia. American Journal of Psychiatry, 161(11):2126-31, 2004.
Buysse DJ, Reynolds CF, Monk TH, Berman SR, Kupfer DJ. The Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index: A new instrument for psychiatric practice and research. Psychiatry Research, 28(2):193-213, 1989.
Complete list of published work: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/myncbi/browse/collection/40800059/?sort=date&direction=ascending