David Drew Pinsky, M.D. (born September 4, 1958), better known as Dr. Drew, is an American radio and television personality and board-certified internist and addiction medicine specialist. He is the host of the nationally syndicated radio talk show, Loveline, which he has hosted since 1984. On television he produces and stars in the VH1 show Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew, its spinoffs Sex Rehab with Dr. Drew and Celebrity Rehab Presents Sober House, and the MTV show Sex...With Mom and Dad.
As a medical doctor, Pinsky is Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Keck School of Medicine at the University of Southern California, former Medical Director for the Department of Chemical Dependency Services at Las Encinas Hospital in Pasadena, California, staff member at Huntington Memorial Hospital, and a private practitioner.
Pinsky was born in Pasadena, California and attended Polytechnic School. His father, Morton Pinsky (1925—2009), was a physician; his mother, Helene Stanton (1925-), is a retired singer and actress. He majored in biology at Amherst College, graduating in 1980, and earned his M.D. at the University of Southern California School of Medicine in 1984. He served his residency in internal medicine at USC County Hospital and became chief resident at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena, and eventually moved into private practice.
Pinsky is a nonobservant Jew. He admits to abandoning most Jewish practices but claims to retain a continued desire to learn about the religion. He explains that religious as well as philosophical studies affect his medical practice and his speeches. He says that his background places “an indirect coloring on every answer.”
As The New York Times described it in February 2008, Pinsky's dual career in medicine and the mass media has required him to "navigat[e] a precarious balance of professionalism and salaciousness."
Loveline
In 1984, while still a medical student, Pinsky started appearing in "Ask a Surgeon", a new segment of a Sunday night KROQ show hosted by Jim "Poorman" Trenton and "Swedish" Egil Aalvik. "Ask the Surgeon" soon combined with "Loveline", another Sunday night segment, into a show of its own, co-hosted by Trenton and Pinsky.
Loveline went national in 1995, and the television version launched on MTV the following year, hosted by Pinsky and Adam Carolla. The exposure on both radio and television made Pinsky the "Gen-X answer to Dr. Ruth Westheimer, with an AIDS-era, pro-safe-sex message."
The MTV show ran for four years, while the radio show continues on today without Carolla, who left the show in 2005.
Other radio work
On November 27, 2007, Pinsky began Dr. Drew Live, another nationally syndicated talk radio show where he focused on a wider genre of health issues. It originated from KGIL in Los Angeles, originally airing weekdays from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm PT Although the show was canceled in December, 2008, as of February 28, 2009 the show's website is still up and old shows can still be downloaded and listened to via the website.
Other media appearances
Dr. Drew Pinsky made his acting debut in "Terminal, a 1998 episode of the TV show Space Ghost Coast to Coast, and later appeared on Dawson's Creek and Family Guy.
In addition to his radio show and medical career, Pinsky also has gained fame on television talk shows. He served as "health and human relations expert" on the first season of the U.S. TV series Big Brother in 2000. He has also hosted his own television series, Strictly Sex with Dr. Drew, on the Discovery Health Channel, which was followed by Strictly Dr. Drew. The newer program addressed everyday health issues, premiered on July 25, 2006, and continues to air weekly on Tuesdays at 7:00 pm PT.
In 2008, Pinsky starred in Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew, a reality television show which involves celebrities in a drug rehabilitation facility. The show was filmed at Pasadena Recovery Center, with Pinsky serving as the resident medical expert. The series premiered January 10, 2008 on VH-1, and has been renewed for multiple seasons. A followup show to Celebrity Rehab with many of the same celebrities was Sober House, which began its first season in January 2009, and included celebrities from the first two seasons of Celebrity Rehab continuing their recovery in a sober living facility.
Pinsky also appears on the MTV series Sex...with Mom and Dad.
Pinsky makes frequent guest appearances on a variety of news programs where he usually gives his observations on the relationship between controlled substances and high-profile individuals. He has frequently given his views on the deaths of people such as Anna Nicole Smith, Heath Ledger and Michael Jackson, arguing that their fates should set examples of the seriousness of misusing drugs.
In November 2009, Pinsky starred a spinoff of Celebrity Rehab, Sex Rehab with Dr.Drew. Patients included members celebrities being treated with sexual addiction, described as serious and potentially as fatal as drug or alcohol addiction. The rehab program took place over three weeks at the Pasadena Recovery Center.
TV appearances in which Pinsky did not appear as himself include The Adam Carolla Project, Minoriteam, Robot Chicken, My Gym Partner's a Monkey, and Code Monkeys. Pinsky has also been in the films New York Minute and Wild Hogs.
Other work
In 2003, Pinsky authored Putting Broken Lives Together Again, recounting his experiences as the Medical Director of the Department of Chemical Dependency Services at the Las Encinas Hospital drug rehabilitation clinic in Pasadena, California. He also contributed to the book When Painkillers Become Dangerous: What Everyone Needs to Know About OxyContin and Other Prescription Drugs, published in 2004.
In addition to his media appearances, Pinsky speaks at college campuses and other public venues. When Adam Carolla and Pinsky were teamed as hosts of Loveline, Carolla and Pinsky spoke at colleges.
In 1999, Pinsky co-founded an Internet-based community and advice site for teenagers called DrDrew.com with Curtis Giesen. Among their early backers was Garage.com. DrDrew.com soon ran out of funding, and the company was sold to Sherwood Partners Inc., a corporate restructuring firm, which sold the remnants to DrKoop.com in November 2000.
In 2009 Pinsky drew criticism from experts for publicly offering professional opinions of celebrities he has never met or personally examined, based on media accounts, and has also drawn the ire of some of those celebrities. Following comments Pinsky made about actor Tom Cruise's belief in Scientology and Lindsay Lohan's drug abuse, Cruise's lawyer compared Pinsky to Joseph Goebbels, and Lohan posted on Twitter, "I thought REAL doctors talked to patients in offices behind closed doors." Pinsky also received criticism in April 2010 for stating that he would frame Lohan for illegal drug use in order to force her into a sobriety program if he were her father. Pinsky responded in the same publication that his remark was intended as hyperbole and a "flight of journalistic excess," not a suggestion as a treatment modality in any way. He stated his intent was to drive home the point about bringing negative consequences to bear for a person dying of addiction when all other options have been exhausted.
Pinsky, who admits in his 2009 book, The Mirror Effect, that he scored a 16 on the Narcissistic Personality Inventory (average is 18 for celebrities), and shares several traits with the "closet narcissist", asserts that he was never motivated by fame to become a media figure, but from a desire to educate the public on the medical facts distorted by the media. Patient Andy Dick, who made Pinsky his primary care physician, disputes the accusation that Pinsky is motivated by a desire for fame, insisting that Pinsky "really is just this unbelievably caring guy. He really is. He’s almost too caring." Sex Rehab alumnus Duncan Roy, however, has criticized Pinsky's competence. While Roy concedes that Pinsky is highly skilled at treating drug and alcohol addiction, he claims that Pinsky has no knowledge of sex addiction, that he merely recycled the words and ideas of Jill Vermiere, MFT, one of the therapists on Sex Rehab, who Roy says, along with Dr. John Sealy, were the true therapeutic forces behind his recovery.
Defending the practice of paying addicts to attend rehab, producer Pinsky says, "My whole thing is bait and switch. Whatever motivates them to come in, that’s fine. Then we can get them involved with the process."
Pinsky married on July 21, 1991, and he and his wife Susan had triplets Douglas, Jordan, and Paulina in November 1992.
Pinsky lives in Pasadena, California. An avid fitness person since his early teens, he goes running and does weight training regularly. In addition to his hobby of traveling, he also enjoys singing opera, as his mother was a professional singer. Pinsky stated on the June 24, 2009 episode of Loveline that at one point, he was torn between practicing medicine and becoming a professional opera singer. Pinksy stated that he auditioned for a celebrity singing show, but that the show passed on his appearance when he made it clear to producers that he could not sing pop songs, but did perform an aria on Turn Ben Stein On.
Pinsky's father, Morton, died suddenly of a cerebral haemorrhage on October 27, 2009. A title card at the end of the season 3 finale of Celebrity Rehab dedicated the episode to him.
