Loren Mosher - Biography

Biography

Loren Mosher was born on the 3rd of September 1933 in Monterey, California, to the married couple of a teacher and boat builder. He earned his undergraduate degree from Stanford University and his medical degree from Harvard University, starting work at NIMH in 1964. He undertook research training at the Tavistock Clinic in London from 1966 to 1967 and developed an interest in alternative treatments for schizophrenia.

Before conceiving Soteria, Mosher supervised a ward in a psychiatric hospital at Yale University as its assistant professor, prescribed neuroleptics and was not “against” them. But by 1968, the year Mosher received the position of director of the Center for Schizophrenia Studies at the NIHM, he got convinced that benefits of neuroleptics were overhyped.

The house, known as Soteria, was opened in an area of San Jose, California, in April 1971. Mosher believed that the violent and controlling atmosphere of psychiatric hospitals and the over-use of drugs hindered recovery. Despite its success (it achieved superior results than the standard medical treatment with drugs ), the Soteria Project closed in 1983 when, according to Loren Mosher and Robert Whitaker further funding was denied because of the politics of psychiatry that was increasingly controlled by the influence of pharmaceutical companies.

Mosher is said to have had a far more nuanced view of the use of drugs than has been generally thought, and did not reject drugs altogether but insisted they be used as a last resort and in far lower doses than usual in the United States.

After dismissal from NIMH, he 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.

During the Ritalin phenomenon of the 1990s, he was often featured as a dissenting view in scores of articles. He was the founder and first editor in chief of Schizophrenia Bulletin.

Mosher edited or co-authored some books, including Community Mental Health: A Practical Guide, and published more than 100 reviews and articles. He held professorships and ran mental health programmes on both the US coasts. Mosher also headed his own consulting company, Soteria Associates, providing research, forensic and mental health consultation and cooperated for years with numerous advocacy groups, including the psychiatric survivor group MindFreedom International. He wrote a preface to Peter Lehmann’s book Coming off Psychiatric Drugs (2004).

Dr. Mosher moved to San Diego from Washington in 1996. He became clinical professor of psychiatry at the University of California at San Diego medical school.

He was married to, and later divorced, Irene Carleton Mosher.

At the time of his death he was in Berlin for experimental cancer treatment.

Survivors included his wife, Judy Schreiber, three children from the first marriage, a granddaughter, and two brothers.