Beth Alison Maloney is the national attorney advocate for the recognition and treatment of PANDAS/PANS, a voluntary role she undertook after her son suffered severe mental illness as a result of an undiagnosed strep infection. Harnessing her skills and contacts gained from working in the entertainment industry, she pushed recognition of his disorder forward starting with the publication of her memoir Saving Sammy. Sold to Random House in a bidding war, it propelled the disorder to national attention when she appeared on the Today Show with her fully recovered son Sammy. Seeking to further empower parents, she wrote Childhood Interrupted (2013). It is the one and only resource guide about the disorder. In 2015, she was named by the Wall Street Journal in “5 Things to Know About PANS.” She also championed the 2016 documentary “My Kid Is Not Crazy.” With scores of television appearances, articles, broadcast interviews, worldwide speaking engagements, and meetings with medical deans and physicians, her work as a catalyst for change in this area of medicine is inspiring.
Beth Maloney’s legal experience encompasses representation of clients in the fields of business, entertainment, medicine, child protection, and school law.
Her business experience includes entertainment, corporate, and securities law. In private practice, she has handled a range of clients in the entertainment industry including writers, directors, producers on feature film (including production work on independent features), television, and documentary projects. She had day to day legal responsibilities for The Tonight Show for many years. As a studio VP of legal affairs she was responsible for motion picture and television projects, supervised outside counsel (including litigation), and closed multi-million dollar financing deals. She has served as co-executive producer/co-producer on three films.
When civil rights have been in jeopardy, Ms. Maloney has opposed powerful state agencies as well as private institutions. Ms. Maloney is solidly protective of her clients and an effective courtroom advocate, having made 1000+ court appearances before courts in Maine and Massachusetts. She has served as a Guardian ad litem for hundreds of neglected and abused children in the child protection system resulting in a particular expertise in the field of child protection law. She has gained national recognition in the cutting edge area of “medical kidnapping” cases, when the state attempts to remove children from their parents due to disagreements among physicians over medical conditions. She also consults on private custody cases that involve children with complex medical conditions.
Ms. Maloney’s media appearances and interviews include the Today Show, The Doctors, Mystery Diagnosis, W5, the Glenn Beck Show, Fox News LA, Good Morning LA, 207, AM Northwest, Fox Q13 Seattle, GMA Health, the Bonnie Hunt Show, Sirius XM’s Doctor Radio, various Public Radio stations, internet and podcast programs, multiple articles in print and online including The Boston Globe.
Presentations before national medical/research and parent conferences include the University of California at Irvine, the International Obsessive Compulsive Disorder Foundation, the Northeast PANS/PANDAS Conference, PANDAS Ireland, PANDAS Canada, and Autism One.
Ms. Maloney has been called upon to consult as a patient and mental health advocate with parents and physicians across the country. A relentless advocate and groundbreaker, Ms. Maloney was the first to compile a database of treating physicians and launch a network of support groups that currently meet nationwide.
“Saving Sammy is about my two-year struggle to obtain the correct diagnosis and treatment for my son Sammy when he contracted obsessive-compulsive disorder through a strep infection (PANDAS). Published by Random House on September 22, 2009, this is the first book ever written about the disorder. The lives of thousands of sick children have been changed by my relentless efforts focusing public and medical attention on recognizing and treating this previously obscure disorder. And that is exactly why I wrote this book.”
– Beth Maloney
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