Dr. Carl Bell

Dr. Carl Bell serves as Director of Public Health and Community Psychiatry and is a Clinical Professor of Psychiatry and Public Health. He was recruited to UIC in 1983. He is President/CEO of the Community Mental Health Council Foundation, a community-based organization providing comprehensive mental health services to the Chicago metropolitan area.

His contribution to the African American community through his work in Public Health and Community Psychiatry is impressive. For more than 35 years, he has worked tirelessly as a mental health advocate for the African American Community. Throughout his career, he has worked to provide mental health services to the local community and shape policy decisions at the federal and local levels. “One thing that I would say about my tenure at UIC is that by being involved with the academic research at UIC, because I am also deeply on the community service side, I have been able to transport the research we have done at UIC directly into the community as I take research and apply it in the real world of service. I have taken several UIC research products and moved them into the real world a la HIV prevention in South Africa, Violence Prevention in Chicago Public Schools and soon to do work in New Orleans.”

In addition, he is a national leader in Mental Health and Community Psychiatric research. Listed in Who’s Who Among Black Americans, Dr. Bell has published more than 375 articles on mental health issues involving women, children and the African American community. He has received numerous honors and awards and was appointed to the Chicago Board of Health in 2002 by Mayor Richard M. Daley. More recently, Dr. Bell was appointed to the National Institute of Mental Health National Mental Health Advisory and he served as an International Fellow – Institute of Philosophy, Diversity, and Mental Health, Center for Ethnicity and Health, Faculty of Health, University of Central Lancashire, Preston, United Kingdom, 2007.