Harold W. Koenigsberg, M.D.

Professor of Psychiatry, Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York


Harold W. Koenigsberg is Professor of Psychiatry at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine. He is known internationally for his clinical work in the area of mood and personality disorders. He is an author of two books on borderline personality disorder, one of which has been published in seven languages. He has published widely on the neurobiology, phenomenology and treatment of borderline personality disorder and has also published on the psychobiology of depression, anxiety disorders, and schizotypal personality disorder.

Dr. Koenigsberg’s primary area of interest is in the integration of psychological experience with underlying neural processes. A principal focus of his interest is the inter-relationship between neurobiologic, psychological and social contributors to personality and its disorders. Dr. Koenigsberg’s current work focuses on mood regulation, social cognitive neuroscience, and in the psychobiology and treatment of borderline and schizotypal personality disorders. He is currently conducting several fMRI studies which image the brain’s activity during emotional processing and during memory retention processes, in healthy volunteers and in patients with borderline personality disorder, avoidant personality disorder, schizotypal personality disorder and schizophrenia. He is also studying the role of second messenger systems in emotional instability in personality disorders. Dr. Koenigsberg’s research is funded under two RO1 grants from the National Institute of Mental Health.

Dr. Koenigsberg is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. He is a member of the Task Force on Personality Disorders of the World Federation of Societies for Biological Psychiatry. He is a member of the editorial board of the Journal of Personality Disorders and serves on the Scientific Program Committee of the Society for Biological Psychiatry. Dr. Koenigsberg is a member of the board of directors of the International Society for the Study of Personality Disorders. He serves as a member of the Psychoanalytic Research and Development Fund. He is Co-chair of the 11th International Congress of the International Society for the Study of Personality Disorders. He was an advisor to the American Psychiatric Association DSM-IV Borderline Personality Disorder Work Group, has been a member of the editorial board of the Journal of the American Academy of Psychoanalysis, and Co-Chaired the Program Committee for the 40th Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Psychoanalysis. He has been an examiner for the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology and a specialist site visitor in Psychiatry for the American College of Graduate Medical Education’s Residency Review Committee. Before joining the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, Dr. Koenigsberg had been at the Weill Cornell Medical School, where he was recipient of a Faculty Scholar Award supporting his research. In addition, he has been active as a psychiatric educator, teaching medical students as well as psychiatric residents. Dr. Koenigsberg’s teaching excellence was recognized with the Teacher of the Year Award at the Weill Cornell New York Presbyterian Medical Center, Westchester Division. Dr. Koenigsberg is a graduate of Columbia College and the Albert Einstein College of Medicine and holds an M.A. in Physics from Columbia University. He is a Founding Board Member of the Hope for Depression Research Foundation.

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