William S. Breitbart, MD

I am a board-certified psychiatrist whose expertise focuses on the psychiatric aspects of pain, symptom control, and palliative care in cancer patients. I have been Chief of the Psychiatry Service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center since 1996 and Vice Chair of the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences since 2009, and currently serve as Acting Chair of the Department. I provide individual interventions to patients, couples, and family members. In addition, I am the psychiatric liaison to the Hepatobiliary Disease Management Team and the Pain and Palliative Care Service. I am also a member of the Brain Tumor Center faculty.

I also lead the psychotherapy laboratory, which conducts novel counseling interventions for cancer patients at all stages of disease and cancer types as well as couples and families. My research interests have included fatigue related to cancer and AIDS; depression in terminally ill AIDS and cancer patients; meaning-centered psychotherapy for advanced cancer patients; and delirium research.