Ronald R. Fieve

Ronald Robert Fieve (March 5, 1930,

Fieve received his medical degree from

Fieve notes that when he presented his lithium findings along with Ralph Wharton in 1966, it drew a lot of attention from the American public as it seemed to be the first medication that specifically treated a specific psychiatric disorder. In the same year he was appointed to a lithium taskforce convened by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and their conclusions resulted in the FDA approving lithium for mania in 1970.^[3]

In the 1970s Fieve appeared on numerous national TV talk shows extolling the virtues of lithium for 'manic depression', along with former patient and famous playwright

Also in the 1970s Fieve, Joseph L. Fleiss and David L. Dunner were instrumental in drawing attention to the concepts of 'hypomania' (lower intensity mania) and the related diagnosis of Bipolar II disorder. They published an influential article in 1976, though Fieve credits the term 'Bipolar II' to Dunner and colleagues while at the NIMH in the early 70s before their work together in New York. Fieve and Dunner then coined the term 'rapid cycling', published in 1974, for those patients with more than four mood changes per year which seemed to correlate with failure to respond therapeutically to lithium. These concepts have been reflected in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) since the 1990s.^[6][7]

Since 1975 he held senior posts at the New York State Psychiatric Institute, Columbia University and the Presbyterian Hospital.^[3]

Fieve had a private practice and research offices in

• Dunner, David L., and Ronald R. Fieve. "Clinical factors in
  Archives of General Psychiatry
  30, no. 2 (1974): 229–233.
• Lawrence Sharpe, Joyce R. Alexander et al. "A possible vulnerability locus for bipolar affective disorder on chromosome 21q22. 3." Nature Genetics 8, no. 3 (1994): 291–296.
• Fieve, Ronald R., Stanley R. Platman, and ROBERT H. PLUTCHIK. "The use of lithium in affective disorders: I. Acute endogenous depression."
  American Journal of Psychiatry
  125, no. 4 (1968): 487–491.
• Stallone, Frank, Edward Shelley, Julien Mendlewicz, and Ronald R. Fieve. "The use of lithium in affective disorders, III: a double-blind study of prophylaxis in bipolar illness."
  American Journal of Psychiatry
  130, no. 9 (1973): 1006–1010.
• MENDLEWICZ, JULIEN, RONALD R. FIEVE, and FRANK STALLONE. "Relationship between the effectiveness of lithium therapy and family history."
  American Journal of Psychiatry
  130, no. 9 (1973): 1011–1013.

References