Dr Pratima Murthy

Dr. Pratima brings about 30 years of extensive experience and exceptional accomplishments in the field of mental health. A well-recognized leader in addiction psychiatry, she has been instrumental in the successful development of state-of-the-art Centre for Addiction Medicine at NIMHANS.

She has served as a consultant to prominent international agencies such as the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the World Health Organisation (WHO). She has also served as a resource person for various flagship training programmes in substance abuse prevention and tobacco cessation in the country, and across the globe. 

Dr Pratima is also recognised for her contribution in improving care for persons with mental illness through her work with the National Human Rights Commission on quality assurance in mental health care both in institutions and in the community.

In recognition of her research and academic excellence, Dr. Pratima has received numerous awards and honours including the prestigious Dr. Raja Ramanna State Award by the Government of Karnataka and Lifetime Achievement Award from Rotary. Recently, she was honoured with the WHO Regional Director’s Special Recognition Award on ‘World No Tobacco Day 2021’ for her remarkable service in tobacco control. A prolific author, she has more than 300 research publications in various international indexed journals and scientific books to her credit.

Dr. Pratima received her MBBS degree from Bangalore Medical College in 1985. She obtained DPM and MD (Psychological Medicine) from NIMHANS in 1987 and 1989 respectively. She joined as a faculty at her alma mater in 1993, and has worked in various academic capacities since then. She is a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians (FRCP), Glasgow.