Dr. Pardes was born in the Bronx, New York, and grew up in Lakewood, New Jersey. He received a B.S., Summa Cum Laude, from Rutgers University (1956) and his M.D. from the State University of New York Downstate Medical Center. He interned at Kings County Hospital in Brooklyn, New York, and took his residency there (1961–62) and (1964–66). He spent two years as a major in the U.S. Army (1962–64). He was a psychiatric research fellow at Downstate Medical Center (1966–68), which, in 1990, granted him an honorary D.Sc. He received his psychoanalytic training at the New York Psychoanalytic Institute (1965–70).
Dr. Pardes served on the faculty of Downstate Medical Center, becoming Chairman of the Psychiatry Department (1972–75), Professor and Chairman of Psychiatry at the University of Colorado (1975–78), and returned east when he was named the Director of the National Institute of Mental Health in Bethesda, Maryland (1978–84). He was the Professor and Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry of the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Columbia and Director of the New York State Psychiatric Institute (1984–89). He was named Vice-President for Health Services and Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at Columbia (1989–99) and Chief Executive Officer and President of Presbyterian Hospital and Health Care in 2000. He has contributed to the literature by editing a book on medical student education.
Dr. Pardes has been active in organizations and has received numerous awards. He was named honorary lecturer by the Downstate Alumnus Association (1922) and received the Alumni Achievement Award (1980), the ACP William Menninger Award (1992), the Dorothy Dix Award of the Mental Illness Foundation (1992), the APA Vestermark Award (1994), the Salmon Award and lectureship of the New York Academy of Medicine (1996), the AAMC Service Award (1993), and the APA Distinguished Service Award (1993). He is a member of the Council of Deans President (1995–2000), Phi Beta Kappa, Alpha Omega Alpha, and the Institute of Medicine.
Dr. Pardes was elected APA Vice President (1986–88) and served as President (1989–90).