Robert Garfield MD

Biography
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Dr. Rob Garfield is a psychiatrist and family therapist, with an active private practice in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania. He also teaches in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania. He was raised in Evanston, Illinois, received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University, and then returned to the Midwest for medical training at Northwestern University Medical School in Chicago. He completed his residency in psychiatry at the University of Wisconsin in 1974.

For nearly 40 years, Dr. Garfield has practiced and taught systems-oriented therapy, which focuses on a person’s total environment in helping them resolve their emotional problems. Over the last decade, he has deeply explored men’s issues, male emotional intimacy and the dilemmas men face in engaging in traditional psychotherapy.

Dr. Garfield was the founding Director of the Hahnemann Masters of Family Therapy Program in Philadelphia, one of the first MFT programs in the country. He is also a founding member and former officer of the American Family Therapy Academy.

Dr. Garfield has written many articles and book chapters on marital and family therapy. His writings have focused on family therapy training, the therapeutic alliance with couples and families. symbolic-experiential and contextual therapies, evaluating and consulting with families and therapists, as well as divorce and remarriage. In recent years he has written about male emotional intimacy, men’s friendships and therapeutic men’s groups (“Friendship Labs”). His articles have appeared in the American Journal of Family Therapy, Family Process, The Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, Contemporary Family Therapy and The Psychotherapy Networker.

He recently published "Breaking the Male Code: Unlocking the Power of Friendship" (New York, Gotham, 2105) and has published articles on male intimacy and friendship in the Huffington Post, and other online publications, including AskMen, Word and Film, and The Good Men Project. He has been interviewed on NPR radio in Wisconsin, NYC, and Philadelphia, and cities across the country on this topic. He now blogs for the HuffPost.

Highly regarded by students and colleagues as a “doctor’s therapist,” Dr. Garfield brings warmth and intellect both to his teaching of medical residents and his work with individuals, couples and families. He is always willing to share from his own basket of failures, as well as his successes. In all of his work, he strives to integrate understanding, humor, a bit of storytelling, an ounce of wisdom, and – always – close and compassionate listening