Richard Ferber

Dr. Richard A. Ferber is an associate professor of Neurology at the Harvard Medical School and Director of the Center for Pediatric Sleep Disorders at Children's Hospital in Boston, MA.

A graduate from Harvard College and the Harvard Medical School, Dr. Ferber trained in pediatrics at Children's Hospital in Boston and was a research fellow at the National Institutes of Health. Additionally, he is board certified in Pediatrics and in Sleep Medicine.

Dr. Ferber became interested in sleep and sleep problems in children while doing fellowships in psychosomatic medicine and psychiatry research. In 1978, he opened the Center for Pediatric Sleep Disorders with a full service Sleep Laboratory. This was the first center dedicated to the diagnosis and treatment of sleep problems in children.

Dr. Ferber has served on the Boards of the American Board of Sleep Medicine and the American Academy of Sleep Medicine. He has received numerous awards and honors, including the AASM's Nathaniel Kleitman Distinguished Service Award in 1994, and their Excellence in Education Award in 2002.

His major research interests include: behavioral and chronobiological aspects of sleep disorders in children, sleep apnea, and parasomnias. He is currently on the editorial board of the journal Sleep and is an associate editor of Sleep Medicine.

Dr. Ferber has written widely in the field, and his book, Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems (originally published in 1985), was published in a revised and expanded edition in 2006. He is also co-editor of the textbook Principles and Practice of Sleep Medicine in the Child, published in 1995 and 2005. His has presented his work on the television show 20/20, and he has been interviewed on the national news on ABC and NBC. He has made multiple appearances on The Today Show, Good Morning America, and CBS’s The Early Show, and he has been on numerous local news and talk shows. He has also been featured in major articles in The New York Times, The Boston Globe, and The New Yorker magazine.