Al J. Mooney, M.D. is recognized internationally as an author and physician leader. He practices
addiction and family medicine in North Carolina and Georgia. He has been board certified in the
specialty of Family Medicine since 1979, and has provided medical care in the specialties of family,
behavioral, community, and addiction medicine for 40 years.
Co-author of the bestselling The Recovery Book, he has gained international recognition as a respected
authority on addiction and recovery. The most recent edition of The Recovery Book launches the
“Recovery Zone” concept which acknowledges recovery from alcohol and drug problems is a
developing process taking years and getting well from addiction is not just stopping the misuse of
alcohol and drugs. He presently serves as a Class A (non-alcoholic) Trustee of Alcoholics Anonymous
and sits on the North Carolina Substance Abuse Professional Practice Board, which licenses
professionals in the addiction field. Dr. Al, as he is fondly called by patients and close friends, has been
recognized by his peers through listings in the current and past editions of the book, Best Doctors in
America. In his current clinical and personal activities, he systematically strives to assist anyone with a
desire to stop drinking to become abstinent and familiar with recovery through Alcoholics Anonymous
or other 12 step fellowship.
Dr. Mooney pioneered the field of addiction medicine. He is an inaugural Diplomat in the American
Board of Addiction Medicine, and he helped to establish the certification standards for the specialty in
the United States while serving on the board of the American Society of Addiction Medicine. He served
as a delegate to the Kroc Summit in 1983 in Santa Barbara, CA, to select a national organization to
represent addiction medicine in American Medicine through the AMA, and in the 1980s he was also
among the first physicians to be certified in Addiction Medicine, a year after he achieved addiction
certification from the California Society of Addiction Medicine.
He maintains an adjunct faculty position with the Department of Family Medicine at the University of
North Carolina - Chapel Hill as Associate Professor, after having joined the faculty in 1979 during his
fellowship year.
Dr. Mooney’s commitment to recovery began in 1959, after his parents entered recovery. He has been
involved in mutual support and professional recovery activities his entire teenage and adult life. He has
facilitated the establishment of recovery programs, twelve-step and professional, in several countries,
and he is presently involved in projects to promote addiction awareness and recovery in Egypt, Bosnia,
Ghana, and the United Kingdom. His global linkages are facilitated by technology between trips to other
countries and continents through the utilization of videoconferencing platforms. This online
collaboration is presently manifested by an online class to Ghana teaching his My Life in Recovery
workshop curriculum.
A recent book, When Two Loves Collide, by Emmy Award nominated producer, screenwriter, and
author, Bill Borchert, chronicled Dr. Mooney’s family recovery experiences through his parents, Dot
and John Mooney. They founded Willingway Hospital in Statesboro, GA. The hospital, devoted entirely Mooney CV 2018 Page 2
to helping alcoholics and addicts, was started in the Mooney home during Dr. Al’s teenage years and its
outcome research during the time Dr. Al was director demonstrates it is among the best in the world. It
has been continuously accredited by the JCAHO since the organization first began to survey facilities
treating substance abuse. Willingway continues to be recognized as one of the foremost hospitals for
addiction treatment, and Dr. Al now serves as board member and Director of Addiction Medicine and
Recovery. He is also Chairman of the Dot and John Mooney Foundation (previously Willingway
Foundation) collaborating with the School of Public Health at Georgia Southern University to sustain a
“recovery campus” where students pursue their education in an abstinent, twelve-step friendly and
“recovery safe” environment.
Dr. Mooney’s service has ranged from work in state-owned and private hospitals, to community service
provider organizations, state leadership and advisory councils, mental health authority administration,
volunteer associations, and homeless shelters.