American College of Orgonomy - Meet the ACO Physicians

The ACO is a group of individuals who feel a strong responsibility to protect and promote natural human functioning.

They accepted this responsibility after learning about the concepts pioneered by Wilhelm Reich, M.D., a physician and social scientist. Many sought the therapy Reich had developed, and found it so beneficial to their emotional well-being that they endured the rigors of medical school-and specialized in psychiatry-just so they could practice medical orgone therapy and expand upon Reich's unprecedented approach.

Today, the physician-members of the ACO are at the forefront of the science of orgonomy, which has as its central principal that an actual, physical "life" energy exists in the universe and flows and pulsates in all living things. When this energy becomes blocked in humans- through chronic contractions in the body-the energy stagnates, and can create emotional as well as physical illnesses.

Physicians on the ACO Board of Regents direct the College's activities, including its orgonomic research. These devoted spirits each, in their own way, have made a significant contribution to orgonomy. Every physician-member on the Board of Regents is board certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology, as well as by the American Board of Medical Orgonomy.

Howard J. Chavis, M.D., has been a medical orgonomist in New York City since 1986. He first learned about orgonomy in 1966 at age 19.

"I met an itinerant hippie named Val," Dr. Chavis recounts. "He lent me a copy of Reich's Selected Writings. I read it from cover to cover." Dr. Chavis says, "not only did the book make immediate and absolute sense, but also I was deeply moved." He went on to read every book by Reich he could find.

"Interestingly, looking at the book Cosmic Superimposition, I realized that I had leafed through this book at the main branch of the Brooklyn Public Library when I was twelve or thirteen years old," he says.

Dr. Chavis is an assistant clinical professor of psychiatry at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, where he teaches a course on "Character and Character Analysis" to fourth-year psychiatry residents. He has been a lecturer and laboratory instructor in the basic and advanced laboratory courses in orgonomic science. He has also authored articles on diverse subjects including orgonomic first aid and the role of the social facade in modern life. He is secretary of the ACO and associate editor of the Journal of Orgonomy. His particular research interest is the orgonomic blood test.

Peter A. Crist, M.D. has been working in medical orgonomy since 1974.

"As a 16-year-old freshman biology student I became intrigued with orgonomy when a friend asked if I had heard of the work of Wilhelm Reich," Dr. Crist says. "He told me, 'he discovered a new form of energy that moves in all living things, but doesn't move the way it should in humans."

Dr. Crist was thrilled to find someone with a scientific approach that was very different from the dry equations that were in his science textbooks. "Reich's observations were lively and addressed issues central to life," he says.

Dr. Crist is an associate clinical professor of psychiatry at the UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, where he received the Excellence in Teaching Award.

Dr. Crist served as ACO president from 1991 to 1998. He continues to chair several ACO committees and is an assistant editor of the Journal of Orgonomy. As a member of the training committee, he teaches the introductory didactic training seminar and the characteranalytic seminar.

Dr. Crist maintains a private practice as a medical orgonomist in Belle Mead, N.J. He treats individuals of all ages, and particularly enjoys working with children and families.

Karl G. Fossum, M.D., a native of Norway, learned about Reich as a high school student there.

"I had a teacher who told me about his therapy with Dr. [Ola] Raknes. He also lent me several of Reich's books," he says. Dr. Fossum then met with Raknes to "find out something about what practicing orgone therapy was like." Based on this experience, Dr. Fossum decided to become a medical orgonomist.

Fossum, who has served as an assistant clinical instructor in psychiatry, has maintained a private practice in medical orgonomy since 1963 in Manhattan.

Robert Harman, M.D. has worked in orgonomy since 1980.

Ever since childhood Dr. Harman says he had a strong curiosity and wanted to get to the root of things in a practical way.

"I started out at Caltech studying mathematics but felt that there was not a sufficient connection with human life there," he says. While at Caltech Dr. Harman was studying creative writing with a well-known author who suggested he read Reich's The Function of the Orgasm. He sat down one morning in the Caltech library with a copy of the book and didn't get up until he had finished it. "

"Here at last was someone who had gotten to the root of things in a way that could make a positive difference in people's lives," he says.

Dr. Harman is treasurer of the ACO, an assistant editor of the Journal of Orgonomy, and director of the College's lab courses. He has written on many topics for the Journal, and often has presented at the ACO's annual conferences, where audiences look forward to his lively presentations.

Dr. Harman maintains a private medical orgonomy practice in Belle Mead, New Jersey.

Charles Konia, M.D. has been working in orgonomy since 1962, when he began attending seminars led by Elsworth E Baker, M.D.

Dr. Konia first became acquainted with the science of orgonomy as a young violinist trying to master the technical difficulties of the instrument.

"Despite having been trained by the finest pedagogue and being able to perform on the instrument in a physiologically correct fashion, there was something missing," he recalls. Dr. Konia says he noticed the "missing something" in other students despite their ability to play the instrument faultlessly. Some characteristic in each person impeded execution to the fullest degree, and that characteristic never varied for each musician.

"With one individual there was an absence of emotional expression, with another there was an excessive use of vibrato in a forced, obtrusive fashion," Dr. Konia says.

Dr. Konia grew interested in Freud and read his writings avidly. Freud's ideas were presented clearly but were unrelated to the problems he faced, he says. Then, Dr. Konia says he was fortunate to come across Character Analysis and the "missing something" became immediately evident. The passage that impressed him was:

Dr. Konia understood that it must be the energy in the chest that is blocked by armor.

"The concepts of energy and armor became real physical entities. In the presence of armor, emotional energy from the chest, particularly longing, cannot move freely into the hands and arms to be expressed musically. This was the basis for the technical limitations in musical execution. Although necessary, no amount of physiologically 'correct' playing would help as long as armor in the chest segment was present," he says.

With those ideas in mind, Dr. Konia entered therapy with a medical orgonomist. As armor was removed in therapy, his playing improved dramatically. What's more, he became so impressed by the power of medical orgonomy that he decided to enter medical school and become a physician so he could study the science.

Dr. Konia is vice president of the ACO, chairman of the training and education committee and Editor-In- Chief of the Journal, to which he regularly contributes. He is also author of the soon-to-be-published Emotional Plague and is completing a second book on medical orgone therapy. Dr. Konia has a private practice as a medical orgone therapist in the Easton, Pennsylvania area.

Richard Schwartzman, D.0., has been practicing medical orgone therapy in Philadelphia since 1973.

He first heard about Reich in his twenties, when he began reading philosophy and psychology.

"Everyone said Reich was crazy and a quack-that he put people in a box to treat them, and believed he discovered something he called 'orgone energy.' So I read the others-Freud, Jung, Adler-but I dismissed Reich," he says.

In 1962, as a first-year medical student, Dr. Schwartzman learned that a "Reichian" would be teaching the introduction to psychiatry course.

"There was a lot of buzz. So I expected to see what I had read about, somebody who was a real odd-ball," he recalls. But, to his surprise, Dr. Schwartzman found a very sensible professor.

"He was very clear-headed about all the issues he discussed-about raising children, early infant contact, the brutality of circumcision," he says.

Although the professor was grounded in Reich's principles he never mentioned one word during his lectures about Reich, orgone energy or the type of therapy he practiced. But Dr. Schwartzman says he was so impressed by this teacher's way of seeing things that he decided to read Reich.

"What I read went in as if I had always known it. I began therapy and knew after my first session that I would become a medical orgonomist and make orgonomy my life's work."

Dr. Schwartzman served for over twenty years as a faculty member and assistant clinical professor at Hahnemann University. He has experience as a forensic psychiatrist working in the criminal justice system.

He is a member of the ACO's training committee and director of the Elsworth F. Baker Advanced Technical Seminar. He is also an assistant editor of the Journal and director of the ACO's public out reach activities. He has established the ACO website, is coordinator of film projects and is the Editor-In- Chief of In Contact.