Les Debbold, MD

Bio

I hope you find it helpful to learn a little bit about me and my practice here at Kaiser Permanente. In addition, my homepage contains a lot of information about the illnesses I treat, medications I prescribe and possible side effects. There are also links to a variety of organizations and databases that can help you learn more about your illness and treatment options. You can also use my site to connect to the pharmacy, schedule appointments or to access other information about Kaiser Permanente programs that are available to you.

I was born in the Los Angeles metropolitan area in 1950, part of the baby boom and in the heart of a sea of middle class Americans, working to fulfill their post-war dreams. My parents ran a small boat business, and I grew up working in the shipping department, the machine shop and the "yard," learning about everything from how to build a hoist to how to repair outboard motors. In school I developed an interest in music, played in the school bands, and eventually branched out into local music groups.

I entered college at the University of Southern California in 1967, majoring in Music. I played percussion and drums and worked as a musician professionally until I decided to go back to school and study Biology in 1976. I ended up graduating with a degree from the University of California Santa Cruz with a degree in Biology and Chemistry in 1978. I worked in a biophysiology lab while attending school to help defray the cost and it was there, with the help of my mentor, Patricia Burke, that I decided to attend medical school. I attended the University of California San Diego School of Medicine and graduated with my MD in 1983.

Choosing a medical specialty was a challenge. I was interested in technology, which made Radiology attractive because the field was literally exploding with new and exciting modalities, for instance ultrasound, Doppler, CT scans, MRI, and Positron Emission Tomography. I was also touched by the human dramas I witnessed every day and the stories, struggles, sacrifices, successes and failures of many of the patients I encountered. Ultimately, the human stories, the desire to understand our unique nature and the compassionate wish to help others through their struggles led me to choose Psychiatry. I completed my Residency in Psychiatry at the University of Chicago in 1989.

I practiced at Northwestern University Medical Center and at several hospital and outpatient clinics in the Chicago area until 1993 when my wife and I moved to Santa Rosa to be closer to home and family. I joined Kaiser Permanente in 1993 as a staff psychiatrist on the adult team.

My Medical Specialty

More details about my specialty:

Psychiatry is a specialty that allows me to work with people in so many different ways, from diagnosis to medication management of complex conditions, to problem solving, to career choices, to dealing with family issues, to personal growth and development. I rarely leave a treatment without feeling that I have benefited from the encounter as well as the patient. Working with the mind requires attention, flexibility, creativity and real collaboration. I love that.

My specialty interests and affiliations within my field:

My interests are primarily in adult conditions. Fine tuning medication choice and management for a variety of depressive and anxiety disorders is endlessly fascinating as is psychotherapy, especially for patients struggling to cope with midlife, aging, family, career, or relationship issues.

Current projects or research:

Group psychotherapy for men is an area of special interest. I've been doing a men's group in our clinic with Jon Seirup, PhD for several years. Adult men have special interests and ways of thinking, feeling and behaving in relationships that are strongly shaped by cultural factors. Exploring these, and other issues, is eye opening.

Great health resources that I refer to:

The links on this website to both Kaiser Permanente and non-Kaiser Permanente sources provide volumes of information about psychiatric conditions.

An interesting story from my training:

One of my instructors, John Raftery, MD, at the University of Chicago, used to give multimedia presentations (before we had PC platforms and software that made this relatively easy) at Grand Rounds that would often baffle and amaze his audience. I remember one especially interesting day when he had two slide projectors showing "Art of the Mentally Ill" and music by David Bern and the Talking Heads playing while he was talking about the unusual emotional expression achievable in dance.

He was facing stage right, 90 degrees from his intended audience, when all at once, all the lights went off, a large photo of Edvard Munch's "The Scream" was projected backstage and Dr. Raftery's wife gave out a blood chilling scream from the back of the hall. Needless to say, we were all abuzz, that being the end of the presentation.

One of our more concrete colleagues raised his hand for a question: "But John, what does it all mean?" which was met by nervous laughter and then 30 seconds of silence. John finally looked at us and said, "If you ask the question, you've chosen your career wisely; if you need an answer, you have not."

Photos from My Training Years or of Practicing Medicine in My Field:

Edvard Munch, The Scream, 1893

Interests

Currently reading:
A Wild Sheep Chase by Haruki Murakami and Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem

My favorite book or author:
Sometimes a Great Notion by Ken Kesey

Great movie:
Billabong Odyssey

Hobby Photos & Links:

Cool Video Clips of Wakeboard Tricks I Can't Do

Family & Friends

People in my life:

My wife and children are the center of my life outside work. She is a psychologist in private practice so we share a base of training and intellectual interests. Mostly, though, we enjoy our children, a love of music, bad TV and all the activities we can squeeze into our busy lives.

My children and people I care about:

Besides my four children at home, we are in the midst of caring for our aging parents. As a full-fledged member of the baby boom generation, I, like so many of my patients, am dealing with the health problems of aging parents, the needs of teenage children and midlife in myself. It keeps us on our toes. There never seems to be enough time to get it all done.

An interesting story about my family or friends:

Every summer, I try to find a week or so to go backpacking in the High Sierra with my children and some old college friends from Santa Cruz. My buddy works with computer technology, loves to surf and skateboard and occasionally exercise bad judgment. While my college friends were in the campground near the trailhead in Yosemite waiting for us to arrive, my buddy decided to skateboard down the access road. Before long he had picked up so much speed that he couldn't jump off and couldn't slow down. He decided to try to ride it out but ended up crashing about 3 miles down the road. How he managed to put a pack on the next morning and to start a 40-mile week-long hike is beyond me.

We also have four cats and two dogs, a collection of animals that seem to fit into our lifestyle. Our dogs, a six-year-old Golden Retriever and a one-year-old Yellow Lab, run roughshod over our yard, garden and house. The latest revelation for our Lab, Scotty, was that he could dig through the cover of the hot tub and find more water to play with. The cats just try to stay out of the way.

Travel

An adventure I've had:

I guess the most exciting (perhaps terrifying) things I've done have all been related to various backpacking trips. Between the first and second year of medical school, I spent a summer traveling in Alaska. Camping in the wilderness there was like nothing else I had done before or since. The feeling of vulnerability and fragility that I had there, under the cloud cover of Denali, watching a herd of Caribou walk up a dry stream bed out of a fog bank, still sends chills up my spine when I think about it.

Favorite place in the world:

I can't pick a favorite, but I'm partial to Lake Tahoe, Hawaii, London and Sonoma County. The colors of Hawaii and Tahoe are interestingly alike, especially the azure blue of the shallow water over sand and under a clear summer sky. Also, the stars at night seem to fairly jump out of the sky away from cities and lights.

One of my recent trips:

I always enjoy watching the night sky from a big slab of granite in the Sierra when backpacking. To look at the Milky Way through binoculars, spot falling stars or satellites passing overhead, or enjoy little tricks of vision that demonstrate our connection to the universe makes me feel more alive and at peace.