Dr. Leon Eisenberg, Pioneer in Autism Studies, Dies at 87

Dr. Leon Eisenberg, who conducted some of the first rigorous studies of autism, attention deficit disorder and learning delays and became a prominent advocate for children struggling with disabilities, died on Sept. 15 at his home in Cambridge, Mass. He was 87.

Dr. Leon Eisenberg

The cause was prostate cancer, said his wife, Dr. Carola Eisenberg.

The field of child psychiatry was dominated by Freudian psychoanalysis when, in the late 1950s and 1960s, Dr. Eisenberg began conducting medical studies of children with developmental problems. Working at Johns Hopkins University with Dr. Leo Kanner, who first described autistic behavior, Dr. Eisenberg completed the first detailed, long-term study of children with autism, demonstrating among other things that language problems predicted its severity.

In a similar study among children who were developing normally, Dr. Eisenberg showed that reading difficulties early in school predicted behavior problems later on.

In the 1960s, he performed the first scientific drug trials in child psychiatry, testing stimulants like Dexedrine and Ritalin to soothe the behavior of children identified as “delinquent” or “hyperkinetic.” These studies, which became the basis for drug treatment of what is now called attention deficit disorder, ran counter to psychoanalytic theories on the most effective treatments.

“Leon took a very courageous stand and denounced the way psychiatry treated children, this whole system in which we had a few rich kids and their parents getting psychoanalysis five days a week and still not being cured,” said C. Keith Conners, a professor emeritus in the department of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University. “No one even knew what a cure looked like. He had this conviction that nothing was being done for the bulk of children who needed help, and that we had very little scientific data to guide us.”

Dr. James Harris, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral science at Johns Hopkins University, said that Dr. Eisenberg was “the pivotal person in 20th-century child psychiatry who moved the field from simple descriptions of childhood disorders to actually looking at the science behind both the diagnosis and treatment.”

Leon Eisenberg was born in Philadelphia on Aug. 8, 1922, the eldest child of immigrants from Russia. He earned his undergraduate degree and, in 1946, his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania, before taking an internship at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, where he developed an interest in psychiatry. He completed his psychiatric residency at Sheppard Pratt Hospital in Towson, Md.

After two years in the Army teaching physiology (Carey incorrectly said psychology), in 1952 he began a residency at Johns Hopkins and his collaboration with Dr. Kanner. In 1967, he took over as chief of psychiatry at Massachusetts General Hospital, where he continued to publish and, among many other projects, helped formulate and carry out affirmative action policies at Harvard Medical School.

In 1980, he established the medical school’s department of social medicine, with the aim of applying the tools of social science to improving access to and practice of medicine worldwide.

In addition to his wife, a co-founder of Physicians for Human Rights, Dr. Eisenberg is survived by two children from a previous marriage, Kathy and Mark Eisenberg; two stepchildren, Alan and Larry Guttmacher; two sisters, Essie Ellis and Libby Wickler; and six grandchildren.

For two days last week, Harvard lowered its flags to half-staff in honor of Dr. Eisenberg.

In his later years, Dr. Eisenberg became increasingly alarmed at trends in the field he helped establish, criticizing what he saw as a cozy relationships between drug makers and doctors and the expanding popularity of the attention deficit diagnosis.

The diagnosis “has morphed from a relative uncommon condition 40 years ago to one whose current prevalence is 8 percent,” he wrote. “Correspondingly, the prescription of stimulant drugs has gone up enormously. The reasons are not self-evident.”

FORMER US PRESIDENT BILL CLINTON APPOINTS Harvard's Dr. Paul farmer as DEPUTY SPECIAL ENVOY FOR HAITI

New York, 3 August 2009 – Continuing his efforts as UN Special Envoy for Haiti, President Clinton today appointed Dr. Paul Farmer as the Deputy UN Special Envoy for Haiti. Dr. Farmer will support President Clinton and be responsible for advancing their work on a day-to-day basis.

“Paul’s selfless commitment to building health systems in the poor Haitian communities over the last 20 years has given millions of people hope for a brighter future for Haiti,” President Clinton said. “His credibility both among the people of Haiti and in the international community will be a tremendous asset to our efforts as we work with the government and people of Haiti to even more to improve health care, strengthen education, and create economic opportunity.”

The Office of the UN Special Envoy for Haiti was created in June 2009 to help advance economic development in Haiti and assist the Haitian Government in implementing its priorities. While announcing President Clinton’s appointment as UN Special Envoy for Haiti, UN Secretary-General Ban stated that “no one is better placed for this mission. He knows the country. He loves the people. They love him. This is the strong wish of the Haitian people and the Haitian Government and myself, as Secretary-General.”

“I am honored to serve as the UN’s Deputy Special Envoy for Haiti,” said Dr. Farmer. “President Clinton’s dedication to improve the lives of Haitians for so many years has been inspiring to me. Since 2005, we have worked together with local governments on the very successful Rural African Initiative which has developed health care systems in Africa. I look forward to working with him and with the Haitian Government and people as they implement their plans for a better future.”

“In Haiti, we welcome the appointment of Paul Farmer as the UN’s Deputy Special Envoy for Haiti,” said President Preval. “Dr. Farmer has been a good friend to the Haitian people for many years. I look forward to working with President Clinton, Dr. Farmer, and all friends of Haiti on our efforts to create new jobs, strengthen essential services, build infrastructure, and enhance the prosperity of all Haitian households.”

Medical anthropologist and physician Paul Farmer has dedicated his life to improving health care for the world's poorest people and has pioneered novel community-based treatment strategies and successfully shown that quality health care can be delivered in resource-poor settings. He is a founding director of Partners In Health (1987), an international non-profit organization that provides direct health care services and undertakes research and advocacy activities on behalf of those who are sick and living in poverty. Dr. Farmer began his lifelong commitment to Haiti in 1983 when still a student, working with villages in Haiti’s Central Plateau, determined to bring modern health care to the poorest people in the Western Hemisphere. Starting with a one-building clinic in the village of Cange, Farmer’s project has grown to a multi-service health complex that includes a primary school, an infirmary, a surgery wing, a training program for health outreach workers, a 104-bed hospital, a women’s clinic, and a pediatric care facility. Over the past twenty years, Dr. Farmer and Partners In Health have expanded their operations to ten sites throughout the Haiti. His work has become a model for health care for poor communities worldwide with Partners In Health now working in ten countries around the globe.

Dr Farmer holds an M.D. and Ph.D. from Harvard University, where he is a professor of Social Medicine and the Chair of the Department of Global Health and Social Medicine and Chief of the Division of Global Health Equity at Brigham and Women's Hospital. He is a widely published author of numerous books and articles on health and human rights and social inequality. He is subject of Pulitzer Prize winner Tracy Kidder's best seller Mountains Beyond Mountains: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, a Man Who Would Cure the World, which chronicles the development of Dr. Farmer's work in Haiti and beyond.

Dr. Farmer is the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including the Margaret Mead Award from the American Anthropological Association, the Outstanding International Physician (Nathan Davis) Award from the American Medical Association and the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation "genius award." He is a member of the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences and has recently been elected to membership in the American Academy of Arts & Sciences.

*****************************

I am just overwhelmed by the work I have to do at home, at HMS, and at HSPH - and my very best friend will be here this weekend.

I ask all my friends, acquaintances, and would-be friends to 'friend' me on all OTHER social media UNTIL Facebook increases total allowable connections beyond 5000 (I have maxed out with the TOTAL number of friends, groups, contacts, fanning, etc = 5000) and to READ MY BLOGS here and all the others, all linked at http://Maynard.Clark.GooglePages.com

Oddly, I'm taking a day off from work to sleep. Is being tired a result of feeling overwhelmed?