DENDRITE] Wash. Post & NY Times: Loren Mosher dissident psychiatrist obits

[Guest guest]

> " David Oaks - www.MindFreedom.org "

> <oaks

> Tue, 20 Jul 2004 10:28:43 -0700

> " NEWS: human rights in mental health "

> <dendrite

 

> [DENDRITE] Wash. Post & NY Times: Loren

> Mosher dissident

> psychiatrist obits

>

> MindFreedom News http://www.MindFreedom.org 20 July

> 2004

>

> UPDATED NEWS about death of Loren Mosher, hero to

> the

> psychiatric survivors human rights movement, and

> board

> member of MindFreedom International.

>

> BELOW find obituaries in both _Washington Post_ and

> _New York Times_. At bottom are links to more news,

> remembrance pages you may add to, and more

> information.

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~

>

> [Administrative note to dendrite list: A technical

> problem

> allowed spam to get on this list yesterday. We are

> taking

> all urgent steps to stop this. This is our main

> human rights

> alert list, so please stay on!! If you have any

> complaints,

> or praise, please let us know at

> office. Thanks.

> -- David Oaks, Director, MindFreedom

> International]

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~~

>

> _WASHINGTON POST_

>

> Contrarian Psychiatrist Loren Mosher, 70

>

> By Adam Bernstein

>

> Washington Post Staff Writer

>

> Tuesday, July 20, 2004; Page B06

>

> Loren R. Mosher, 70, who died of liver cancer July

> 10

> at a clinic in Berlin, was a contrarian psychiatrist

> and schizophrenia expert who was dismissed from the

> National Institute of Mental Health for his

> controversial theories on treatment.

>

> While chief of NIMH's Center for the Study of

> Schizophrenia from 1968 to 1980, Dr. Mosher decried

> excess drugging of the mentally ill; large treatment

> facilities like St. Elizabeths Hospital that he

> would

> have preferred to raze; and the sway pharmaceutical

> companies had over professional groups.

>

> He advocated a largely drug-free treatment regimen

> for schizophrenics, which still runs counter to a p

> revailing opinion for using antipsychotic drugs for

> schizophrenics in the United States.

>

> His position was based on a view that schizophrenics

> are tormented souls who needed emotionally

> nourishing

> environments in which to recover. He said drugs were

> almost always unnecessary, except in the event of a

> violent or suicidal episode.

>

> He eventually established small, drug-free treatment

> facilities that were more akin to homes than

> hospitals.

> His young care providers in one center, Soteria

> House

> in San Jose, lived and performed household chores

> with

> the handful of patients.

>

> " The idea was that schizophrenia can often be

> overcome

> with the help of meaningful relationships, rather

> than

> with drugs, and that such treatment would eventually

> lead to unquestionably healthier lives, " Dr. Mosher

> once

> wrote.

>

> As late as 2002, he claimed that 85 percent to 90

> percent

> of his clients returned to the community without

> conventional hospital treatment.

>

> In 1998, Dr. Mosher resigned from the American

> Psychiatric

> Association, which he called a " drug company patsy. "

>

> " The major reason for this action is my belief that

> I am actually resigning from the American

> Psychopharmacological Association, " he wrote in his

> resignation letter. " Luckily, the organization's

> true identity requires no change in the acronym.

> At this point in history, in my view, psychiatry

> has been almost completely bought out by the drug

> companies. "

>

> Loren Richard Mosher was born in Monterey, Calif.,

> and

> lived with various relatives after his mother's

> death from breast cancer when he was 9. He worked

> in oil fields in the American West as a young man

> to earn money for medical school, or so he told his

> employers. What was then a lie, he said, soon

> became truth as his co-workers came to the allegedly

> aspiring doctor with complaints about colds and

> sexual

> diseases.

>

> After graduating from Stanford University and

> Harvard

> University medical school, he arrived at NIMH in

> 1964.

> His early schizophrenia research involved identical

> twins, one with schizophrenia and the other without

> the psychotic disorder. His research emphasized

> the " psychosocial " factors that he felt led one

> toward exhibiting symptoms but left the other one

> apparently normal.

>

> Creating Soteria House in the early 1970s, he said,

> caused lasting trouble with the psychiatric

> community.

> After showing studies of patient recovery that

> matched

> traditional treatment with medication, the project

> lost its funding amid a strong peer backlash. So

> did a second residential treatment center in San

> Jose.

>

> " By 1980, I was removed from my [NIMH] post

> altogether, "

> he wrote. " All of this occurred because of my strong

> stand against the overuse of medication and

> disregard

> for drug-free, psychological interventions to treat

> psychological disorders. "

>

> He then taught psychiatry at the Uniformed Services

> University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda and

> became head of the public mental health system in

> Montgomery County. He started a crisis house in

> Rockville, McAuliffe House, based on Soteria

> principles.

>

> He was a prolific contributor to scientific journals

> and co-wrote several books, including " Community

> Mental

> Health: A Practical Guide " (1994). During the

> Ritalin

> phenomenon of the 1990s, he was often featured as a

> dissenting view in scores of articles. " If you tell

> a lie long enough, it becomes the truth, " he said of

> the medication.

>

> Dr. Mosher moved to San Diego from Washington in

> 1996.

> At his death, he was a clinical professor of

> psychiatry

> at the University of California at San Diego medical

> school and was in Berlin for experimental cancer

> treatment.

>

> His marriage to Irene Carleton Mosher ended in

> divorce.

>

> Survivors include his wife of 16 years, Judy

> Schreiber

> of San Diego; three children from the first

> marriage,

> Hal Mosher of Fairfax, Calif., and Tim Mosher and

> Heather

> " Missy " Galanida, both of Los Angeles; two brothers;

> and a

> granddaughter.

>

>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A63107-2004Jul19.html

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~~

>

> _NEW YORK TIMES_

>

> L.R. Mosher, Innovator at Mental Health Institute,

> Dies at 70

>

> July 18, 2004

>

> By ANAHAD O'CONNOR

>

> Dr. Loren R. Mosher, a former National Institute of

> Mental

> Health official who developed a drug-free approach

> to

> treating schizophrenia and argued that psychiatrists

> should

> rely less heavily on antipsychotic medications, died

> on

> July 10 at a clinic in Berlin. He was 70.

>

> The cause was liver disease, his wife, Judith

> Schreiber,

> said.

>

> In the 1960's and 70's, as psychiatrists were

> beginning to

> prescribe powerful new antipsychotic drugs to treat

> schizophrenia, Dr. Mosher advocated using

> little-known

> alternative therapies instead. From 1968 to 1980,

> while

> chief of the Center for Studies of Schizophrenia at

> the

> mental health institute, he began a long-term study

> that

> compared drug-free treatments with conventional

> hospitalization.

>

> Through decades of research, he found that patients

> who

> were randomly assigned to live in a

> psychotherapeutic,

> residential setting with few medications did just as

> well

> as patients given drugs. In some cases, when the

> person had

> never taken any medication, he found the outcome was

> even

> better.

>

> " Loren believed that you couldn't just give drugs to

> someone who is in deep distress and ignore them, "

> said Dr.

> David Cohen, a professor of social work at the

> School of

> Social Work at Florida International University and

> a

> former colleague of Dr. Mosher. " He said that there

> was

> therapeutic value in just being with someone and

> bearing

> the discomfort of it. Just giving the patients drugs

> would

> only distance yourself from them. "

>

> The centerpiece of Dr. Mosher's research project was

> a

> 12-room house in San Jose, where one psychiatrist

> and a

> live-in staff cared for a group of about half a

> dozen young

> schizophrenics. The center, called Soteria, or

> " deliverance " in Greek, had a no-drugs rule unless

> patients

> became violent or suicidal. Staff members shared

> cooking

> and normal household chores with the patients and

> were

> encouraged to view them as their peers.

>

> The goal, Dr. Mosher later wrote, " was to provide a

> simple,

> home-like, safe, warm, supportive, unhurried,

> tolerant and

> nonintrusive environment. "

>

> Dr. Mosher was convinced that supportive, social

> relationships could help his patients rebound from

> psychosis. He viewed the illness as a coping

> mechanism, a

> response to years of various traumatic events that

> caused

> the person to retreat from reality.

>

> " Basically what they're saying is: 'Hey, folks, I'm

> out of

> here. I'm constructing this world as it pleases me,

> and I

> don't need to pay attention to that world out there.

> I'm

> going to live in this one because that one out there

> hurts,' " he said in a 2003 interview with the San

> Diego

> Weekly Reader.

>

> By 1974, Dr. Mosher had opened a second residential

> treatment center in San Jose called Emanon. Both

> centers

> lasted until the early 90's, when financing dried

> up. But

> they inspired more than a dozen similar residential

> centers

> in Switzerland, Germany, Norway, Italy and other

> parts of

> Europe.

>

> In his later years, Dr. Mosher wrote and spoke

> widely about

> his cynicism toward the pharmaceutical industry's

> influence

> on physicians. He resigned from the American

> Psychiatric

> Association in 1998, citing an " unholy alliance "

> between

> psychiatrists and drug makers.

>

> Born in 1933 in Monterrey, Calif., Loren Richard

> Mosher

> earned his undergraduate degree from Stanford and

> his

> medical degree from Harvard. In the 1960's, he did

> early

> research at the mental health institute, studying

> sets of

> identical twins in which one had schizophrenia and

> the

> other did not. He focused on their family lives and

> upbringing, seeking to identify psychosocial factors

> that

> might have brought on mental illness.

>

> Dr. Mosher was a clinical professor of psychiatry at

> the

> University of California at San Diego medical

> school.

> Throughout his career, he wrote more than 100

> scientific

> articles and reviews. In 1989, he published a book,

> " Community Mental Health: Principles and Practice, "

> which

> has since been translated into five languages.

>

> His first marriage to Irene Mosher, ended in divorce

> in the

> early 70's.

>

> In addition to his wife of 16 years, Judith, who

> lives in

> San Diego, he is survived by two sons, Hal, of

> Fairfax,

> Calif., and Tim, of Los Angeles; a daughter, Missy

> Galanida

> of Los Angeles; two brothers, Roger, of San

> Francisco, and

> Harold, of Casper, Wyo.; and one granddaughter.

>

>

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/18/national/18mosher.html?

>

> ex=1091126009 & ei=1 & en=d24badc0612d4d1c

>

> ~~~~~~~~~~

>

> Please forward.

>

> PsychRights has " remembrance page " on web you may

> add to:

>

>

http://psychrights.org/InMemoriam/LorenMosher/Loren.htm

>

> Laing Society also has a remembrance page you may

> add to, with an obit:

>

> http://laingsociety.org/

>

> The San Diego Weekly Reader on Loren Mosher is here:

>

>

http://www.antipsychiatrie.berlinet.de/artikel/foreign/mosher_2003.htm

>

> Loren's preface to Peter Lehmann's new

> book " Coming off Psychiatric Drugs " is here:

>

> http://www.p.lehmann.berlinet.de/withdraw.htm#loren

>

> bio:

>

> http://www.moshersoteria.com/bio.htm

>

> Loren's work:

>

> http://www.moshersoteria.com/

>

> Info about Soteria:

>

> http://www.moshersoteria.com/soteri.htm

>

> Psychology Today article:

>

>

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1175/is_5_32/ai_55625499

>

> Letter of resignation from American Psychiatric

> Association

>

> http://adhd-report.com/biopsychiatry/bio_12.html

>

> Original message from MindFreedom:

>

>

http://psychrights.org/InMemoriam/LorenMosher/Loren.htm

>

> To join, renew or donate to MindFreedom:

>

> http://www.mindfreedom.org/join.shtml

>

> Please forward, thanks.

>

>