Robert Galbraith Heath (May 9, 1915 – September 21, 1999) was an American
psychiatrist.
[1][2] He followed the theory of
biological psychiatry that organic defects were the sole source of mental illness,
[3] and that consequently mental problems were treatable by physical means. He published 425 papers and three books.
[4][5][6] One of his first papers is dated 1946.
[7] He was profiled as a "famous American psychiatrist" in 1983 by
Psychiatric Annals.
[8]
Heath founded the Department of Psychiatry and Neurology at
Tulane University,
New Orleans, in 1949 and remained its chairman until 1980.
[4][9][10] He performed many experiments there involving
electrical stimulation of the brain via surgically implanted electrodes. He placed
deep brain stimulation (DBS) electrodes into the brains of more than 54 patients.
[11][12][13][14] Indeed, he has been cited as the first, or one of the first, researcher(s) to have placed electrodes deep into the brains of living human patients.
[15][1] It has been suggested that this work was financed in part by the government, particularly the
CIA or
U.S. military.
[16][17][18]
In 1972, he claimed to have
converted a homosexual man to heterosexuality using DBS.
[13][19] Heath also experimented with the drug
bulbocapnine to induce stupor, and
LSD,
[20][21] using prisoners in the
Louisiana State Penitentiary as
experimental subjects.
[22] He worked on
schizophrenia patients, which he regarded as an illness with a physical basis.
[23] Today Heath's work is considered highly controversial and is only rarely used as reference material.
[1][24][25]
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