About H. Charles Fishman M.D.
Dr H. Charles Fishman MD is a general, child, and adolescent psychiatrist with nearly 40 years of experience treating families, adolescents, and patients with eating disorders.
He is currently the clinical director at Reconnect Family Services and NZ Eating Disorder Specialists Ltd., both located in New Zealand.
An Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, University of Hawaii, John A. Burns School of Medicine, Dr Fishman is recruited for his supervision and teaching in Europe, South and Central America, United States, Southeast Asia, and New Zealand and Australia.
Curriculum Vitae
- 1972
- Graduated Medical College of Wisconsin. Post-graduate medical training at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic. He was board certified in general psychiatry in 1975 and child psychiatry in 1976. Dr. Fishman served as both Director of Training and Distinguished Senior Trainer at the Philadelphia Child Guidance Clinic. In that those roles, he oversaw a large training program which included child psychiatry, psychology, social work, as well as an extern program which trained clinicians in family therapy in the USA and abroad.
- 1981
- Co-authored, with Salvador Minuchin, the book Family Therapy Techniques, Harvard University Press. This book continues to be a standard text in the field and has been translated into 8 languages.
- 1986 - 1990
- Medical Director of Diversified Health Services. He was involved with establishing an innovative, family therapy based adolescent inpatient unit at York (PA) General Hospital. During this period Dr. Fishman published 2 books: Treating Troubled Adolescents (Basic Books (1989) translated into 4 languages), and Evolving Models of Family Change (Guilford Press (1986) with Dr. Bernice Rosman).
- 1989
- Established the Institute for the Family, in West Windsor, New Jersey. This clinic trained professionals, and provided community based mental health services to children and their families. The Institute for the Family received a yearly grant from 1989-1994 from the NJ Department of Health to train administrators and clinicians, as well as to provide direct service to adults and children with substance abuse problems, and to develop demonstration projects. During that period, Dr. Fishman conceptualized and clinically directed a program called Community Structural Therapy, which linked a family therapist with an indigenous person from the community. This program, which continues within the School-Based Programs in the most distressed communities in New Jersey, provides secondary intervention as well as prevention services for high-risk youngsters. Dr. Fishman also was President of the Center for the Family, a program that provided innovative treatment of severe eating disorder patients.
- Dr. Fishman conducted hundreds of workshops and presentations across the US and abroad. He gained extensive frontline clinical experience, treating or supervising approximately 20,000 cases.
- 1993
- Published Intensive Structural Therapy (Basic Books), which has been translated into 4 languages.
- 1994
- Chosen from a national competition as an Annie Casey Fellow. During this fellowship, he obtained extensive leadership training provided by the Wagner School. During his first field Placement he worked with Robert Cole, Ph.D. and Mary Jane England, M.D. at the Washington Business Group on Health. The focus was consulting with states to design Medicaid managed care systems, specializing in systems of care for severely emotionally disturbed children.
- He also worked at the Massachusetts Dept. of Mental Health. During that Placement, he served as the program coordinator to develop a Robert Wood Johnson (RWJ) Foundation replication grant. The goal was to provide services to the hundred highest need youngsters in the Boston area by pooling funding from the various agencies: Medicaid, Medicare, Mental Health, Public Health, Juvenile Justice as well as education. This innovative model provides integrated health services utilizing an HMO (Healthcare Maintenance Organization) as the provider.
- In Massachusetts, Dr. Fishman initiated a Family Integration program which led to the development, by families and providers, of an evaluation instrument, which is used to compare the degree that facilities incorporate family participation in their programs. During his 2 ½ months in Boston, Dr. Fishman, in conjunction with Joan Mikula, Commissioner of Children's Mental Health, produced a documentary video tape of three high need children. These children, in the course of their care, cost the State $1,000,000 in three years. The goal was to demonstrate the need for community-based alternatives.
- Dr. Fishman's project during his Casey Fellowship was the development of a Medicaid Managed Care "Buyers Guide", which is presently operated by the Center for Health Care Strategies. He worked with CHCS to expand the covered areas to include special needs populations such as HIV, the homeless, substance abuse and the fragile elderly.
- 1996
- Founding Medical Director of Community Behavioral Health, a managed care company that is a component of the Philadelphia Health Department. It provides behavioral managed care to over 450,000 Medicaid recipients. In 1999, Dr. Fishman, changed position within CBH to Senior Psychiatric Consultant. In this position, he developed innovative programs for severely emotionally disturbed children.
- 2000
- Medical Director for Behavioral Healthcare at Health Partners, a physical health Medicaid and Medicare HMO that has 150,000 members. In this role, he is responsible for the overseeing and enhancement of integration of care between Primary care physicians and behavioral healthcare providers. In addition, he oversees population-based initiatives in areas such as the care of depression in the physical health care network and improving prescribing patterns to children.
- Senior Consultant at Middlemore Hospital in Auckland, New Zealand. In that capacity he designed a program for severely emotionally disturbed youngsters who have intersectorial involvement.
- 2002
- Clinical Director, Maori Mental Health Waitemata DHB (District Health Board). In that capacity, he provides direct clinical care as well as working to develop programs with the goal of providing a comprehensive system of care to the Maori population of West and North Auckland.
- 2004
- Published the book Enduring Change in Eating Disorders which presents qualitative data from his treatment of cases of Anorexia Nervosa and Bulimia Nervosa with follow-up interviews from up to 20 years post therapy.
- 2006
- Director, NZ Eating Disorder Specialists - a private clinic in Auckland to help people and their families overcome eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia.
- Clinical Director, Youthlink Family Trust, Auckland.
- 2011
- Associate Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Hawai'i John A. Burns School of Medicine.
- 2013
- Published the book You Can Fix Your Family which introduces the tenets and principles of Intensive Structural Therapy (IST), a powerful transformative approach for radically improving family life.
- 2016
- Clinical Director, Reconnect Family Services, Manakau, Auckland.
