Dr. Mark Gold is a professor of psychiatry at the University of Florida College of Medicine in Gainesville. He has conducted groundbreaking research into opiate addiction, its mechanism of action in the brain, and treatments.

Tonja Myles is a former addict and founder of the Set Free Indeed Ministry and Clinic in Baton Rouge, La., a faith-based addiction clinic. Myles was recognized by former President Bush at the 2003 State of the Union address. She and her husband, Darren, founded Set Free Indeed 14 years ago. They offer one-on-one counseling for people […]

Dr. Mary Holley is a doctor in Arab, Ala., who founded a Christian-based support group called Mothers Against Meth-Amphetamine, or MAMa, in 2002 after her brother died of methamphetamine addiction. The group now has 75 chapters around the country. She has produced several educational videos for drug education and prevention and speaks in schools and jails. The group […]

Dr. John Knight is the associate director for medical education in the division on addictions at Harvard Medical School in Cambridge, Mass., and a leader in pediatric education. He has studied spirituality and alcohol use in adolescents, and treatment and prevention of alcoholism in adolescents.

Howard Shaffer is an associate professor at Harvard Medical School and director of the Division on Addictions. He has written extensively about the treatment of addictive behaviors and the nature of addictions.

Dr. Richard Saitz is a professor of medicine and epidemiology at Boston University’s School of Medicine, associate director of the Youth Alcohol Prevention Center and director of the Clinical Addiction Research and Education program. He studies the effectiveness of a brief, hospital-based tailored intervention for patients with alcohol problems.

Dr. Marc Galanter is director of the division of alcoholism and drug abuse in the department of psychiatry and a professor at the New York University School of Medicine. His books, Spirituality and the Healthy Mind: Science, Therapy and the Need for Personal Meaning (Oxford University Press, 2005) and Cults: Faith, Healing and Coercion (Oxford University Press, 1999), deal […]

Alexandre Laudet is a social psychologist and the director of the Center for the Study of Addictions and Recovery at the New York City-based National Development and Research Institutes. NDRI, a nongovernmental research agency, works to advance scientific knowledge of substance abuse, mental health, HIV/AIDS and related social and health concerns in order to contribute […]

Christopher D. Ringwald was a journalist in Albany, N.Y., and the author of The Soul of Recovery: Uncovering the Spiritual Dimension in the Treatment of Addictions (Oxford University Press, 2002). Ringwald studied and wrote about how the use of spirituality within a wide range of treatment options works. He also examined the controversies surrounding the faith-based treatment […]