Searles, Harold F.

Searles, Harold F. (Frederic)

(1918– ) psychiatrist; born in Hancock, N.Y. After taking his B.A. at Cornell (1940) and his M.D. at Harvard (1943), he interned at the New York Hospital and then served in the United States Army Medical Corps (1945–47). He worked as a psychiatrist for the Veterans Administration Mental Hygiene Clinic in Washington, D.C. (1947–49), and then joined the staff of the Chestnut Lodge Sanitarium (now Hospital) in Rockville, Md. (1949–64). After studying at the Washington Psychoanalytic Institute (1947–53), he began his long affiliation with the faculty of that institute (1955). In addition to other teaching and staff positions in psychiatry and psychotherapy in the Washington, D.C., area and at Columbia University's medical school (1964–73), his other major affiliation was with Georgetown University's medical school (1964–80). He also maintained a private practice of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy for three decades. He published some 65 articles and several books, including My Work with Borderline Patients (1986), focusing particularly on psychosis, schizophrenia, and the dynamics of the psychoanalytical process between therapists and patients. He received numerous honors including the Frieda Fromm-Reichmann Award for Research on Schizophrenia (1965).