Wrenda Gallien

Wrenda Gallien (born 1951) is an African American pioneer in the field of Psychiatry.

Gallien graduated from Loma Linda University with a BS in Biology in 1974. In 1983 she graduated from the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences with a Doctor of Medicine. She proceeded to do a categorical internship in Psychiatry, a residency in General Psychiatry, and a fellowship in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in 1988.

After completing her fellowship, Gallien was the first African American Assistant Medical Director at the Centers for Youth and Families in Little Rock, Arkansas. Gallien was the assistant professor of Psychiatry at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, and the first minority to teach in the Department of Psychiatry. At Pinewood Hospital in Texarkana, Arkansas, in 1991, Gallien was the first black Medical Director and the first black Director of Youth Services. While in Texarkana she also distinguished herself as the first black psychiatrist to operate a private practice in the city. That same year Gallien became the first black Medical Director of Charter Hospital in Little Rock, Arkansas, and the first black Child and Adolescent Psychiatrist to operate a private practice in the state of Arkansas.

Gallien's early career was distinguished by breakthrough treatments in Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and focused on innovative and effective methods to decrease school violence. In 1985, Gallien began lecturing and consulting in cultural competency in the health care setting.

In 1999, Gallien started a private practice in Jefferson, Indiana, the first African American to do so in the city, and also the first to operate a private practice in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry in Jefferson, Indiana. In Louisville, Kentucky, in 2001 Gallien opened another private practice in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, called the Alternative Health Therapy and Wellness Center, becoming the first African American in the state of Kentucky to operate a private practice in Child Psychiatry.