Interview with David Brendel, MD, PhD

Hi everyone! I recently had the great privilege of interviewing Dr. David Brendel. I have known David for almost two years now and I just adore his style and approach to clinical work. He is, in the truest sense, a humanist scientist. He brings a flexibility and creativity to the science of clinical work.

On top of that, David has a scary impressive resume. David has a private psychiatry practice in Belmont and a is a Certified Executive Coach with a practice in Boston called Leading Minds Personal and Executive Coaching. He is the Medical Director of Psychiatry at Walden Behavioral Care, an treatment facility that offers a continuum of care for eating disorder and psychiatric patients. David earned his M.D. from Harvard Medical and his Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Chicago. He has a dozen or so peer reviewed articles, multiple book chapters, and is the author of MIT press book Healing Psychiatry. And because he does not have enough to do, he also host a radio “Leading Minds with Dr. David Brendel” and consults for several major TV networks.

You can see David is a bit of a psychology renaissance man, making him the perfect person with whom to explore the complex nature of eating disorders.

Below is the audio for the interview. There are also a few moments where there is a leaf blower in the background. I did my best to take it out but I’m sorry for any problems it cause!

Without further ado, let the interview begin…