Dr. Jeffrey Lieberman: The Untold Story of Psychiatry

Wed, Mar 18 2015 - 12:00pm
Jeffrey Lieberman, M.D.; Lawrence C. Kolb Professor and Chairman of Psychiatry, Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons; Author, Shrinks: The Untold Story of Psychology
Renee Binder, M.D., Professor and Director Psychiatry and Law Program, UCSF; President-Elect, American Psychiatric Association - Moderator

Psychiatry has come a long way since the days of cruelly chaining "lunatics" in cold cells and parading them as freakish marvels before a gaping public. However, the path to legitimacy for "the black sheep of medicine" has been anything but smooth. Through a period that saw hydrotherapy, lobotomies and primal screaming regularly used as treatments, psychiatry has endured serious growing pains on its way to becoming an accepted evidence-based profession. Dr. Lieberman traces the history of the field, from its birth as a mystic pseudo-science to its maturity, all the while arguing that we should dispel the stigma linked to mental illnesses and treat them as diseases rather than as unfortunate states of mind.