Peter R. Breggin, M.D.
Fifty Years of Psychiatric Reform


      Peter R. Breggin, M.D. has been informing the professions, media and the public about the potential dangers of drugs, electroshock, psychosurgery, involuntary treatment, and the biological theories of psychiatry for almost four decades.  Since 1964 Dr. Breggin has been publishing peer-reviewed articles and medical books in his subspecialty of clinical psychopharmacology. He is the author of dozens of scientific articles and nineteen professional books about psychiatric medication, the FDA and drug approval process, the evaluation of clinical trials, and standards of care in psychiatry and related fields. 

      Dr. Breggin's reform work began in the 1950s as a college student when he directed the Harvard-Radcliffe Mental Hospital Volunteer Program. Peter R. Breggin, M.D. began full time private practice of psychiatry in 1968. In 1972 he founded The International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology (ICSPP) as a nonprofit research and educational network.  ICSPP is concerned with the impact of mental health theory and practices upon individual well-being, personal freedom, and family and community values.  Dr. Breggin also founded the scientific peer-review journal, Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry.

Many of Dr. Breggin's additional reforms in the psychiatric field are detailed here.

      For thirty years Dr. Breggin has served as a medical expert in many civil and criminal suits including product liability suits against the manufacturers of psychiatric drugs.  His work provided the scientific basis for the original combined Prozac suits and for the Ritalin class action suits.  His efforts as a medical expert have resulted in the FDA changing numerous official drug labels.  In November 1998 he was a scientific presenter at the National Institutes of Health Consensus Development Conference on Diagnosis and Treatment of Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder.
  
     Dr. Breggin is the author of nineteen professional books.  Some of his bestselling books include Toxic Psychiatry (1991), The Antidepressant Fact Book (2001), Talking Back to Ritalin, Revised (2001), Your Drug May Be Your Problem: How and Why to Stop Taking Psychiatric Drugs (with David Cohen, Ph.D., 1999), and Talking Back to Prozac (with Ginger Ross Breggin).  Dr. Breggin's professional books include Brain-Disabling Treatments in Psychiatry: Drugs, Electroshock and the Role of the FDA and The Heart of Being Helpful: Empathy and the Creation of a Healing Presence, both published by Springer Publishing Company. Dr. Breggin has also published approximately thirty peer-reviewed articles in the field of psychiatry. 

Go to Dr. Breggin's resume and bibliography.

Go to Dr. Breggin's professional website for further information about his books.

     Peter R. Breggin, M.D. graduated with honors from Harvard and then received his medical training at Case Western Reserve. He took his psychiatric training at the State University of New York, Upstate Medical Center, and at the Massachusetts Mental Health Center, where he was also a teaching fellow at Harvard Medical School. Before going into private practice in 1968, he spent two years as a full-time consultant with the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH). Dr. Breggin more recently had a faculty appointment to the Johns Hopkins University Department of Counseling.

     Dr. Breggin's work is often covered in the national media such as the New York Times, Time,  the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and the New Yorker. He regularly appears on radio and television, including "Oprah," "Larry King Live," "Montel Williams,"  "20/20," "60 Minutes," "Hannity and Colmes," and "Nightline." Dr. Breggin frequently gives workshops and presentations in North America and Europe.