Pfeiffer Treatment Center

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Pfeiffer Treatment Center is a U.S. clinic devoted to orthomolecular psychiatry and medical research particularly pertaining to autism and pyroluria, and the neurobiology of criminal behavior.

[edit] About the Center

The Pfeiffer Treatment Center - Health Research Institute is located in Warrenville, Illinois, and says it is dedicated to two main purposes — affording patients in need of it access to treatment as suggested by an orthomolecular understanding of psychiatry, and engaging in medical research. Its focus in research has mainly been on the bio-neurological causes of violence and delinquency and autism.

Named in honor of Carl Pfeiffer, a pharmacologist and physician who contributed to orthomolecular medicine, the center is a not-for-profit 501(c)(3),[1] and has a fund that helps make its therapies available to the indigent.[2] A further endeavor is training physicians overseas.[3] Robert deVito, M.D., a part-time consultant at Pfeiffer, was chairman of the department of psychiatry at Loyola University Chicago's medical school.[4]

The Center reports treating patients with schizophrenia, ADHD, and autism, and claims an overall success rate of 85% success rate; a physician who has gaind a reputation for questioning the orthodoxies concerning the conditions "treated", notes that their methods have not been rigorously tested and disparages them as "snake oil".[5]

Chief scientist William J. Walsh recently made headlines by reporting that his investigation of Ludwig van Beethoven's hair provided to him by the Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies had convinced him that Beethoven had died of lead poisoning, though he noted that the tests "came back somewhat short of definitive".[6]

[edit] Footnotes

  1. ^ Health Research Institute and Pfeiffer Treatment Center. Retrieved on January 26, 2007
  2. ^ Pfeiffer Hope Fund. Health Research Institute and Pfeiffer Treatment Center. Retrieved on January 26, 2007
  3. ^ Australia MDs Only (PDF). Health Research Institute and Pfeiffer Treatment Center. Retrieved on January 26, 2007
  4. ^ Staff biographies. Health Research Institute and Pfeiffer Treatment Center. Retrieved on January 26, 2007
  5. ^ Skertic, Mark. "For some, a question of balancing nutrients", SunTimes.com, April 21, 2002.  Available at the internet archive. Retrieved on 2007-04-09
  6. ^ Weiss, Rick. "Study Concludes Beethoven Died From Lead Poisoning", The Washington Post, December 6, 2005, p. A08. Retrieved on 2007-04-10. 

[edit] External links