News Advisory

Actress Kathryn Erbe to raise the curtain in NIDA’s Addiction Performance Project

Kathryn Erbe

Kathryn Erbe leads an impressive cast in the Addiction Performance Project, an innovative continuing medical education (CME) program for doctors and other health providers, on April 16 in the Chicago, Ill. area. The performance is a project of the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health, and is designed to help doctors and other health professionals better identify and help drug-abusing patients in primary care settings, and to break down the stigma associated with drug addiction.

The program will begin with a dramatic reading of Act III of Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night, with Kathryn Erbe reading the part of Mary Tyrone, the morphine addicted matriarch of a family devastated by addiction. Ms. Erbe joins other notable leading ladies, including Debra Winger and Blythe Danner, in reading this role as part of the Addiction Performance Project. The reading will be followed by an expert panel reaction and facilitated audience discussion to explore the challenges for providers in working with addicted patients and the experience of these patients and their families. The performance is free and open to the public. Advance registration is recommended.

What:	NIDA’s Addiction Performance Project
When:	Monday, April 16, 2012, 5:30-7:00 p.m.
Where:	Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine Lurie Building - Hughes Auditorium 303 E. Superior, Chicago, Ill. www.northwestern.edu/campus-life/chicago-campus/index.html
Who:	Featured Actors (subject to change) Kathryn Erbe (Mary Tyrone) Arliss Howard (James Tyrone) Bob Braswell (Edmund Tyrone) Polly Noonan (Cathleen) Featured Panel Members Daniel Angres, M.D. (Feinberg School of Medicine) Michael Fleming, M.D., M.P.H. (Feinberg School of Medicine) Daniel McGehee, Ph.D. (University of Chicago)

A performance will also be held earlier that day for registrants of the 42nd National Council Mental Health and Addictions Conference. If you are a journalist and wish to attend either of these performances, please send an email to: media@nida.nih.gov.

The project is part of NIDAMED, NIDA's outreach to practicing physicians, physicians in training, and other health professionals. The Addiction Performance Project has a limited run through 2013. For more information, visit: www.drugabuse.gov/nidamed/APP.

Follow Addiction Performance Project news on Twitter at @NIDANews, or join the conversation by using: #nidaAPP.

The National Institute on Drug Abuse is a component of the National Institutes of Health, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIDA supports most of the world’s research on the health aspects of drug abuse and addiction. The Institute carries out a large variety of programs to inform policy and improve practice. Fact sheets on the health effects of drugs of abuse and information on NIDA research and other activities can be found on the NIDA home page at http://www.drugabuse.gov/, which is now compatible with your smartphone, iPad or tablet. To order publications in English or Spanish, call NIDA’s DrugPubs research dissemination center at 1-877-NIDA-NIH or 240-645-0228 (TDD) or fax or email requests to 240-645-0227 or drugpubs@nida.nih.gov. Online ordering is available at http://drugpubs.drugabuse.gov. NIDA’s media guide can be found at http://drugabuse.gov/mediaguide/, and its new easy-to-read website can be found at http://www.easyread.drugabuse.gov/.

About the National Institutes of Health (NIH): NIH, the nation's medical research agency, includes 27 Institutes and Centers and is a component of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. NIH is the primary federal agency conducting and supporting basic, clinical, and translational medical research, and is investigating the causes, treatments, and cures for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and its programs, visit http://www.nih.gov/.

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