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Lawrence Kolb

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Lawrence C. Kolb (June 16, 1911 – October 20, 2006) was an American psychiatrist who played a prominent role in mental health administration, research and community mental health.

Lawrence C. Kolb was born in Baltimore, Maryland. Because his family lived in Ireland from 1928 to 1931, he attended Trinity College in Dublin. He returned to the United States to medical school at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. Following graduation, he did residency training in psychiatry and neurology (then considered one specialty) at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, NY. During World War II, he went into the Navy and was stationed aboard hospital ships and then put in charge of a clinic for "battle fatigue" in Portsmouth, NH. After the Navy, Kolb worked at the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, MD and the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN.

In 1954 Dr. Kolb was appointed chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Columbia University Medical Center and director of the affiliated New York State Psychiatric Institute. Kolb oversaw numerous clinical and research advances during his 21-year tenure, the longest of any director. In 1976 Kolb left his posts at Columbia to become the New York State Commissioner of Mental Hygiene and correct abuses in the state system of mental health.

Dr. Kolb was strongly committed to research in psychiatry. Early in his career he did a seminal study of phantom limb pain (see the reference below). Many years later he led a significant study on "battle fatigue" in Vietnam veterans, finding that post-traumatic stress disorder could cause physical signs and symptoms. The research facility at New York State Psychiatric Institute is called the Lawrence C. Kolb Research Building.

His father

His father, also named Lawrence Kolb (1881-1972), was also an eminent psychiatrist. Dr. Kolb Sr. pioneered the medical approach to narcotics addiction treatment and advocated treating drug addicts as patients, not criminals.

References

  • The Painful Phantom. Psychology, Physiology and Treatment. By Lawrence C. Kolb, M.D., Section of Psychiatry, Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minnesota. Pp 50. 1954. Springfield, Illinois: Charles C. Thomas, Publisher. Oxford, England: Blackwell Scientific Publications.
  • A psychophysiological study of post traumatic stress disorder in Vietnam veterans. By EB Blanchard EB, LC Kolb, TP Pallmeyer TP, and RJ Gerardi. Psychiatric Quarterly 1982 Winter;54(4):220-9.
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