Everyone in the close circle of his students called him Teacher. Because we all knew that out of his entire body of work, which was very rich, he considered his teaching work and his role as an academic teacher the most important, a role which far exceeded the formal academic tasks and constituted a way of life for Panagiotis Oulis.
He was born in Nafplio in 1956 and he completed his primary and secondary education there. In 1982 he graduated from the Medicine School of the University of Athens. He continued his studies in France, where in 1984 he completed his dissertation in Medicine at Paris VII, while in 1987 he completed his specialization at Paris XII. Then he returned to Athens and he very soon started working at Eginition Hospital as a clinical associate at the Department of Psychiatry. In 1991 he completed his first PhD thesis in the Medical School of the University of Athens, while in 2000 he completed a second PhD thesis in Philosophy of Science in the Department of Methodology, History and Theory of Science (MITHE) of the University of Athens. For the rest of his life, he worked at the Department of Psychiatry of the University of Athens at the Eginition Hospital at various academic and clinical positions. In 2011 he was promoted to Associate Professor of Psychiatry. In 2013 he took the initiative to found the Philosophy of Psychiatry Branch of the Hellenic Psychiatric Association, where he was chairman. The next year the assessment procedure for his promotion to the position of Professor of Psychiatry was commenced, but unfortunately he passed away before it was completed.
His work, apart from monographs and books, includes over 100 publications in international scientific journals and more than 50 in Greek journals. He received 8 awards for his work at international and Greek conferences. He also contributed to the completion of 12 PhD theses either as the supervisor or as a member of the three-member supervising committee, or simply by helping doctoral candidates. All of his students knew that Panagiotis Oulis was the person they could rely on both for his knowledge and experience and for his support at difficult times. He was personally invested in and anxious about the scientific work of others, even more than the people submitting the work.
The focus of his overall research and teaching work was Clinical Psychopathology. From his early years at Εginition Hospital he established an informal annual course in clinical psychopathology for intern psychiatrists and psychologists, which became an official course of the Department in 2004. At the same time, during the first years of the course, in 1996, he published his first Psychopathology book "Elements of Psychiatric Semiology", which is the first book on this subject ever to be published in Greece. This book has served as a manual for many generations of intern psychiatrists and other mental health professionals. In 2004 he wrote a new, larger Manual of Clinical Psychopathology, which in 2009 was republished in a revised and enriched version. This manual has since been the main reading material of the course with the same title.
His second major area of interest was philosophy of science. His relevant thesis was also the subject of his first book, "The Nature of Mental Illness" followed by two other monographs, "Philosophy of Scientific Psychopathology" and "Philosophy and Methodology of Psychiatry, Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy". Besides his monographs, he produced rich work with contributions to chapters of many psychiatric handbooks, as well as philosophical collections, such as "Freud's apple and Newton's unconscious" and "Perspectives and Foundational Problems in Philosophy of Science". He was also the editor of the Greek translation of the book "The Noonday Demon", one of the world's most widely read books on depression.
Since 2004, Panagiotis Oulis’ Clinical Psychopathology course has been an official course of the First Department of Psychiatry of the University of Athens, has gained great reputation and has been completed by thousands of students, psychiatrists, psychologists and other mental health professionals. His students know that: "the Teacher knew us personally and tested us carefully. He allowed us to develop our own way of thinking, to steer clear of trivialities and to think based on facts and in terms of clinical thinking. He helped us to learn how to keep our minds open and exercise critical thinking, even if it meant we went against his own beliefs". He was fond of debate and constructive confrontation. Starting with a small body of students in 2004, in the following years his course was widely acclaimed and, as a result, there was a rapid increase in the number of participants. Since 2004, he also set up and taught at one more annual course, for a smaller number of participants, the "Course in Philosophy and Methodology of Psychopathology".
Since 2014, the “Course in Clinical Psychopathology” is being continued without him according to his wish. However, it is being continued with his name as part of the title as he is always in our thoughts and in our heart. The Course in Clinical Psychopathology “Panagiotis Oulis” is organized every year in his spirit, according to his method and using his manual by the group of his closest students and associates during the last years of his life. Since 2016, a new annual course with his name is being organized by the First Department of Psychiatry of the University of Athens and the Hellenic Psychiatric Association, the Course in Clinical Skills in Psychopathology “Panagiotis Oulis”.
With his work and his way of life, he created a school of thought for the teaching and practicing of Clinical Psychopathology. Physical death cannot put an end to this kind of work. For it is transferred and continued...
All of the work presented and promoted by Psychopathology.gr is inspired by our teacher, Panagiotis Oulis, and dedicated to him.
