The Harvard Training Program in Psychiatric Epidemiology and Biostatistics, based in the HSPH Departments of Epidemiology, Biostatistics, and Society, Human Development, and Health, presented a special award to Leon Eisenberg, The Maude and Lillian Presley Professor of Social Medicine, Emeritus, HMS, on March 8 in Kresge 110.
Leon Eisenberg accepted the award from Deborah Blacker, associate professor of psychiatry at HMS and associate professor in the HSPH Department of Epidemiology
Eisenberg's contributions to the field of psychiatric epidemiology are many. He identified the rapid return to school as a key to managing separation anxiety that underlies school phobia. He completed the first outcome study of autistic children in adolescence and recognized patterns of language use as the best predictor of prognosis. He introduced randomized controlled trials in psychopharmacology and showed that tranquilizing drugs were inferior to placebo in the treatment of anxiety disorders, whereas stimulant drugs were effective in controlling hyperactivity.
He has served as a consultant to the Division of Mental Health at the World Health Organization in Geneva in multiple capacities since 1964 and to the Pan American Health Organization since 1988.
Copyright, 2007, President and Fellows of Harvard College
