Stephen M. Stahl, MD, PhD, DSc (Hon)

Stephen M. Stahl, MD, PhD, DSc (Hon),  is professor of psychiatry at the University of California, Riverside, and the University of California, San Diego; an honorary fellow at the University of Cambridge; and senior academic advisor for the California Department of State Hospitals. He received his undergraduate and medical degrees from Northwestern University in Chicago, IL, as a member of the Honors Program in Medical Education, and his PhD in pharmacology and physiology from the University of Chicago. Dr Stahl has trained in 3 specialties: internal medicine at the University of Chicago; neurology at the University of California, San Francisco; and psychiatry at Stanford University. He is board certified in psychiatry.

Dr Stahl has held faculty positions at Stanford University, the University of California, Los Angeles; the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology & Neuroscience (previously known as the Institute of Psychiatry) in London; and the UCL Queen Square Institute of Neurology (previously known as the Institute of Neurology) in London. He is currently at the University of California, Riverside; the University of California, San Diego; the State University of New York Upstate Medical University in Syracuse; and the University of Cambridge. He also directs psychopharmacology services and academic programs for the 5-facility, 6500-patient California Department of State Hospitals, where he has a leadership role in addressing violence and decriminalization of the seriously mentally ill. Dr Stahl was formerly executive director of clinical neurosciences at the Merck Neuroscience Research Center in the United Kingdom for several years. His major interests are dedicated to producing and disseminating educational information about diseases and their treatments in psychiatry and neurology.      

Dr Stahl currently serves as editor in chief of CNS Spectrums. He is also past associate editor of the Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica  and former clinical field editor for the International Journal of Neuropsychopharmacology. He is currently on numerous editorial boards of other leading journals, including the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology’s journal Neuropsychopharmacology . He has conducted numerous research projects during his career awarded by the National Institute of Mental Health, the US Department of Veterans Affairs, and the pharmaceutical industry. 

The author of more than 575 articles and chapters with an H index of 62 and more than 2000 scientific presentations and abstracts, Dr Stahl is an internationally renowned clinician, researcher, and teacher in psychiatry with subspecialty expertise in psychopharmacology. He has written 68 textbooks and edited 14 others, including the best-selling and award-winning textbook Stahl’s Essential Psychopharmacology , now in its fourth edition, and the best-selling and award-winning clinical manual Essential Psychopharmacology Prescriber’s Guide,  now in its sixth edition. Dr Stahl has also published the novel Shell Shock , a thriller that recounts the history of posttraumatic stress disorder.

Lectures, courses, and preceptorships based on his textbooks have taken him to dozens of countries on 6 continents to speak to tens of thousands of physicians, mental health professionals, and students at all levels. His books have sold more than 1 million copies, and his lectures and scientific presentations have been distributed as more than 1 million CD-ROMs, internet educational programs, videotapes, audiotapes, and programmed home study texts for continuing medical education to hundreds of thousands of professionals in many different languages. His courses and award-winning multimedia teaching materials are used by psychopharmacology teachers and students throughout the world.  

Dr Stahl serves as a fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology, the British Association for Psychopharmacology, and the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology, where he was formerly vice president, and he is a Distinguished Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association (APA). He also has served on numerous medical and scientific advisory boards for the pharmaceutical industry, the biotechnology and medical information industry, and various nonprofit and public service organizations, including appointment by the State of California and past chair of the Medi-Cal Oversight Board for Medicines (Drug Utilization Review Board).  

He has received numerous awards, including the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology Lundbeck Foundation Award in Education for his contributions to postgraduate education in psychiatry and neurology. His books have won the British Medical Association’s Book of the Year Award, and he was recently awarded the 2016 British Medical Association’s First Place Award for his Digital Masterclass in Psychopharmacology accredited by Cambridge University Health Partners and the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Cambridge. His continuing medical education institute, the Neuroscience Education Institute, has been awarded accreditation with commendation, and his medical education company, Arbor Scientia Group, has been awarded the Business of the Year Award from the local chamber of commerce. Dr Stahl is also the winner of the A.E. Bennett Award of the Society of Biological Psychiatry, the APA/San Diego Psychiatric Society Education Award, and the University of California, San Diego, Department of Psychiatry Residency Teaching Award, and he has been cited as one of “America’s Top Psychiatrists” and one of the “Best Doctors in America.” He was honored with the Distinguished Psychiatrist Award from the APA, and he gave the Distinguished Psychiatrist Lecture for 2013. Recently, his alma mater, Northwestern University, honored him by naming their annual award for the best medical student going into psychiatry the “Stephen Stahl Award.” Dr Stahl was named the 2016 David A Mrazek Memorial Award Winner by the APA, and he delivered the Mrazek Lecture at the APA 2016 Annual Meeting. In 2018, he was awarded an honorary doctorate of science by Üsküdar University in Istanbul, Turkey, for his lifetime of achievements in psychiatry. In 2018, Dr Stahl was invited by the Vatican in Rome to cofound a School of Psychopharmacology, Psychopharmacology and Neuroethics at the Vatican’s European University of Rome in Vatican City, to deal with policy issues to lessen the burden of the seriously mentally ill by bringing together leaders in psychiatry under the auspices of Pope Francis, along with world leaders from government and academia.