Navigation auf uzh.ch
Navigation auf uzh.ch
On September 1, 2008, Prof. Dr. med. Dipl.-Psych. Susanne Walitza took up her post as the new Chair and Medical Director of the Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Service of the Canton of Zurich (KJPD). This made her the first full professor at the KJPD and the PUK, the first female chair of child and adolescent psychiatry in Switzerland and the first female medical director at the University of Zurich.
The child and adolescent psychiatrist and psychologist was previously at the University Hospital of Würzburg, where she worked in a managerial role both in the clinic and in research after specializing as a child and adolescent psychiatrist. With the merger in 2016, the KJPD became the Clinic for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Psychotherapy (KJPP) of the Psychiatric University Hospital Zurich (PUK) and Susanne Walitza became Clinic Director of the KJPP and, from May 2022 to May 2024, Chair of the Medical Directorate on a rotating basis. Her political and scientific commitment covers a broad spectrum and functions, e.g. as founding president of the Association of Swiss Chief Physicians for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, which she chaired from 2013-2018, as Vice Dean for Teaching at the Medical Faculty of Zurich, or as Vice President of the World Federation of ADHD (2011-2015) and Vice President of the World Association of Stress and Anxiety Related Disorders (WASAD, since 2021).
Alongside clinical care, the promotion of young academics is one of Susanne Walitza's most important goals and a matter close to her heart. Every year, numerous interdisciplinary (medicine, psychology, neuroscience, biology) master's and doctoral theses are completed at the KJPP. The graduates and post-doctoral students have received numerous awards and funding support.
The “Psychiatry and Psychotherapy specialization”, the first study track at the Faculty of Medicine Zurich and a model for other specializations, was initiated in 2010 with the collaboration of S. Walitza and has since become well established.