DR THOMAS LEE KAE MENG

About Dr Lee

Dr Thomas Lee Kae Meng received his basic medical degree (MBBS) and Master of Medicine (Psychiatry) from the National University of Singapore (NUS). He was awarded a Health Manpower Development Plan scholarship by the Ministry of Health (MOH) in 2007 for training in gambling addiction treatment at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). He is also a Certified Substance Abuse Counsellor, Certified Gambling Addiction Counsellor, and a Certified Clinical Supervisor in addiction counselling.

Dr Thomas Lee was a past Chief of the Addiction Medicine Department at the Institute of Mental Health (IMH), and a Consultant Psychiatrist at the National Addictions Management Service (NAMS). After his return from UCLA, he led a workgroup to establish a successful gambling treatment programme at IMH. He also oversaw several key initiatives involving substance and alcohol abuse treatment, including adolescent addictions.

Besides addiction psychiatry, he also has extensive clinical experience in the assessment and treatment of various psychiatric conditions, including mood disorders, anxiety disorders, psychosis and forensic psychiatric cases. He sat on several IMH committees involving patient care, including Clinical Risk Management, Assault Reduction, and Clinical Pathways for Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder and Alcohol Dependence. He is also a trained Emergency Behaviour Officer of the National CARE (Caring Action in Response to Emergency) Management System.

He was a key member of the workgroup that developed the MOH Clinical Practice Guidelines on Prescribing of Benzodiazepines in 2008. More recently in 2011, he chaired the workgroup that developed the MOH Clinical Practice Guidelines on Management of Gambling Disorders. He also served as a resource person for the National Council on Problem Gambling. He is a current Executive Committee member of the Association of Professionals Specialising in Addiction Counselling (APSAC).

He has conducted talks and training for doctors, pharmacists, polyclinic staff and other healthcare professionals on various topics including gambling addiction, substance and alcohol addictions, sleep disorders, depression, anxiety and crisis intervention. He has also taught medical undergraduates from Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine and Duke-NUS Graduate Medical School. He led the development and teaching of the Addiction Psychiatry module in the Graduate Diploma in Mental Health for general practitioners. He was also involved in the development of the Addiction Psychiatry curriculum for the psychiatry residency programme. For his research work on the executive function system in pathological gamblers, he received the prestigious clinician-scientist NHG Doctor Award (Bronze) at the 8th NHG Annual Scientific Congress in 2009.

He was a speaker at public forums and the 2009 Singapore Problem Gambling Conference on gambling addiction. He also gave numerous media interviews on topics including substance, alcohol and gambling addictions. He is a co-author and co-editor of the first locally written book on problem gambling “Don’t Gamble Your Life Away! – Help for pathological gamblers”.

Dr Thomas Lee is passionate about helping people recover from mental health adversities. He believes that every person has the ability to safeguard his or her psychological wellness, and to restore mental health in the face of adversities. Through treatment, counselling and training, this ability, or psychological resilience, can be enhanced or reinforced.