“Dr. Durst is a Board Certified Psychiatrist with extensive clinical, teaching and administrative experience, a mix of skills that make her the right person to take on the responsibilities as IOL Medical Director,” said Dr. Harold I. Schwartz, IOL Psychiatrist-in-Chief and Vice President of the HHC BHN. “We welcome her to Connecticut and to the IOL knowing that her leadership, her clinical expertise and her health care management skills will greatly benefit the patients the IOL serves and the community at large.”
Dr. Durst comes to the IOL from the Pennsylvania Psychiatric Institute, where she was Chief Medical Officer. At the same time, she served as Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Penn State College of Medicine. She has worked in all levels of behavioral health care, including inpatient, outpatient, partial hospital, intensive outpatient, residential and nursing home, achieving expertise in the treatment of behavioral dyscontrol in intellectually disabled adults as well as grief therapy.
Originally from Pennsylvania, Dr. Durst attended college at the University of Pennsylvania and Penn State College of Medicine. She completed her internship at Pennsylvania Hospital and residency at The Institute of Pennsylvania Hospital, devoting most of her final year of residency to specialty training in Geriatric Psychiatry.
She has worked as both an administrator and clinical teacher, serving as a medical director of both inpatient and outpatient programs and teaching medical students and residents from the University of Pennsylvania Health System, Jefferson Medical College, the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, and the University of Arizona College of Medicine and College of Pharmacy.
Dr. Durst has received awards for writing, teaching and clinical skill and has been recognized as a Best Doctor in America since 2009.