Stockbridge, MA, Oct. 18, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) — The Austen Riggs Center is pleased to announce the appointment of Dr. Nina Gutin to its Board of Trustees. Gutin is a clinical psychologist with a private practice in Pasadena, California. She conducts trainings in Suicide Prevention and Postvention, facilitates “Survivors After Suicide” groups for the Didi Hirsch Suicide Prevention Center, and is a longstanding member of the Los Angeles Suicide Prevention Network. She received her MS and PhD in clinical psychology from Columbia University and is co-chair of the Coalition of Clinician-Survivors.
Gutin brings to the Board not only her knowledge as a mental health professional, but also a critical perspective as a former Riggs patient (1978-80) and a survivor of suicide loss. “Dr. Gutin’s work around suicide prevention and education aligns squarely with the work of the Center,” remarked Board Chair Dr. Lisa Raskin. “We are fortunate to have her expertise on the Board and her voice to help break the silence and the stigma around suicide and other types of distress.”
“Riggs is one of the rare treatment facilities that accords patients the dignity and respect consistent with an open and ‘examined’ setting,” said Gutin. “I believe in the Center’s mission and look forward to working with the rest of the Board on advancing the excellent clinical work, research, education, and advocacy that Riggs stands for.”
About the Austen Riggs Center Board of Trustees
Austen Riggs trustees draw from their experience in a range of fields including mental health treatment, research, and advocacy; higher education; public policy; law; finance; and publishing, to provide guidance to and oversight of the Center’s administration. Current members are: Lisa Raskin, PhD (Chair), John William Ward Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience, Amherst College; Meiram Bendat, JD, PhD, Founder and President, Psych Appeal; Emily Bernard, PhD, Julian Lindsay Green & Gold Professor, Carnegie Fellow, University of Vermont; Robert DeNoble, MBA, Advisor/Consultant to Innovative Healthcare Companies; Daniel H. Gillison, Jr., BA, Chief Executive Officer, National Alliance on Mental Illness; Joan Goodrich, BA, Retired Vice-President at Bennington College; Laurie Hall, JD, Lawyer at Goulston & Storrs; Dwight Jewson, PhD, Partner, Act3Holdings; Katherine Kennedy, MD, Assistant Clinical Professor at Yale School of Medicine; Chair of the Council on Advocacy and Government Relations for the American Psychiatric Association; Kimberlyn Leary, PhD, Senior Vice President, Urban Institute, Associate Professor of Psychology in Psychiatry, Harvard Medical School/McLean Hospital, Associate Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Lecturer in Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School; Andrew Lustbader, MD, FAAP, Associate Clinical Professor, Yale Child Study Center; Nancy McWilliams, PhD, Visiting Professor, Rutgers Graduate School of Applied & Professional Psychology; Julia Moore, MPPM, LMHC, Executive Coach and Therapist; Jack Po, MD, PhD, Founder of Ansible Health; John Santopietro, MD, Physician-in-Chief, Hartford HealthCare Behavioral Health Network; Senior Vice President, Hartford HealthCare; and Ileene Smith, MA, Editor At Large at Farrar, Straus, and Giroux.
About the Austen Riggs Center
The Austen Riggs Center is a leading psychiatric hospital and residential treatment program that has been serving adults since its founding in 1919. Within an open setting, patients participate in an intensive treatment milieu that emphasizes respectful engagement. Individual psychodynamic psychotherapy is provided four times a week by doctors on staff. The Erikson Institute for Education, Research, and Advocacy of the Austen Riggs Center studies individuals in their social contexts through research, training, education, and outreach programs in the local community and beyond. For more information, visit www.austenriggs.org.
