William Breitbart - Education & Awards

Education & Awards

Dr. Breitbart graduated from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University (New York, NY), and completed residencies in Internal Medicine and General Psychiatry at the Bronx Municipal Hospital Center - Jacobi Hospital. He continued his fellowship training in Psychosomatic Medicine and Psycho-oncology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, receiving both a Clinical Fellowship Award (1985–1986) and a Career Development Award (1986–1989) from the American Cancer Society. Breitbart is Board Certified in Internal Medicine, Psychiatry, and Psychosomatic Medicine.

Dr. Breitbart has been the Chief of Psychiatry at MSKCC since 1996, and was the Director of the ACGME Accredited Fellowship Training Program in Psychosomatic Medicine there. He has been Vice-Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences at MSKCC since 2009, and was named Interim Chairman in June 2012. Dr. Breitbart was a Soros Faculty Scholar of the Open Society Institute, Project on Death in America. He has served as a member of the Board of Directors of the American Pain Society and was a panel member for the American Psychiatric Association Guidelines for the Management of Delirium. He is an active member of the International Association for the Study of Pain and a panel member of the NIH Behavioral Medicine Study Section. Dr. Breitbart has served as the President of the Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine (2007-8), as well as President of the International Psycho-oncology Society(2008–10). Breitbart has been honored as a Plenary Lecturer at various international conferences, including the 8th World Congress on Pain, the 16th Annual American Pain Society Scientific Meeting, and the 5th World Congress of Psycho-Oncology. Dr.Breitbart is the recipient of the 2003 Research Award of the Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine,the 2006 Donald Oken Award from the American Psychosomatic Society, the 2009 Arthur Sutherland Award for lifetime achievement from the International Psycho-oncology Society, and the 2011 Eleanor & Thomas Hackett Award for Lifetime Achievement from the Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine. In addition, Dr. Breitbart has been recognized as one of New York Magazine's "Best Doctors" every year since 2002, and is the recipient of the 2009 Willet F. Whitmore Award for Clinical Excellence from Memorial-Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.

Other past and present professional associations include, but are not limited to, membership and officer positions on:

• The End of Life Advisory Panel, American College of Physicians
• Education for Physicians on End of Life Care Project
• Psychological Distress Clinical Guidelines and Doctor-Patient Communication Panels, National Cancer Center Network
• USMLE End of Life Care Committee
• Co-Chair, International Association of Pain, Task Force on Pain in AIDS
• Research Committee, National Hospice Organization
• Advisory Panel, American Medical Association
• Panel, Agency for Health Care Policy and Research (Clinical Management Guidelines for Acute and Post-operative Related Pain, Cancer Pain
• Psychosomatic Medicine Committee, American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology
• Committee, National Consensus Project on Palliative Medicine
• Honorary President, Brazilian Palliative Care Association
• Co-Chairman, AIDS Committee, American Society for Psychiatric Oncology/AIDS
• AIDS Committee, Neuro-psychiatric Curriculum Project, American Psychiatric Association
• Task Force on Physician-Assisted Suicide, Scientific Program Committee, Academy of Psychosomatic Medicine
• Professional Development Course Committee, Program Committee, American Pain Society
• Fatigue Advisory Board, Ortho-Bitotech, Inc.
• Risk Prevention and Health Behavior Study Section, Center for Scientific Review