Donald L. Thompson, MD

Tennessee Technological University, 1980-82

University of Tennessee, B.A. with Honors, Zoology, 1982-1985

Wake Forest University School of Medicine, M.D., 1985-1989

University of Maryland Medical Center, Residency in General Psychiatry, 1989-1993

University of Maryland Medical Center, Chief Resident in Psychiatry, 1992-1993

Dr. Thompson has been on the faculty at the University of Maryland School of Medicine since 1993 and has served in the Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse since 2000. His clinical work within this division has primarily focused on hospital based consultations for patients with ongoing or suspected drug or alcohol use that may be complicating their acute medical or surgical care or is in need of a clinical intervention while hospitalized at the University of Maryland Medical Center or the R. Adams Cowley, M.D. Shock Trauma Center. He also currently sees patients at the University of Maryland Drug Treatment Center and attends as a psychiatrist with the University of Maryland's Psychiatric Emergency Services team. His previous clinical experiences have included work as an attending psychiatrist in the Department's Division of Community Psychiatry for 16 years, as an attending on the General Psychiatry Consultaton-Liaison service at the University of Maryland Medical Center and as a liaison to the University of Maryland's Greenebaum Cancer Center.

Dr. Thompson's professional expertise also extends to the emerging field of sports psychiatry. He has served as a team psychiatrist for the Baltimore Orioles Baseball Club for over 21 years and as the team psychiatrist for the Baltimore Ravens Football Club for over 4 years. His work primarily consists of providing mental health care to the professional athletes, coaches, staff and families in the training room, clubhouse or the office. He is also involved with interviewing potential player draftees in conjunction with the team's front office staff and scouting departments. He has developed an expertise with the respective professional league offices and teams in administering their therapeutic use exemption programs for athletes who have specific medical or psychiatric disorders that would require a medical exemption to an otherwise banned medication. 

Dr. Thompson began his career at the School of Medicine immersed in medical student education and clinical psychiatry. He served as the Department of Psychiatry's Director of Medical Student Education for 10 years and as the Director of the Medical Student Clerkship in Psychiatry for 12 years and has garnered both School of Medicine, Department of Psychiatry and National awards for excellence in medical student teaching. He has continued to remain active in teaching, having served as a small group faculty preceptor in the first year longitudinal medical student course, Introduction to Clinical Medicine, for 25 years. His work with the Addiction Psychiatry Consultation Service and the Psychiatric Emergency Services team is also rich with the clinical teaching of medical students, psychiatry residents and addiction psychiatry and medicine fellows. He was honored as a Distinguished Fellow in the American Psychiatric Association in 2002.

Sports psychiatry, Addiction psychiatry, Medical Student Education