Dušica Lečić Toševski, a psychiatrist, psychotherapist, and professor of psychiatry, is a full member of the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. She was the director of the Institute of Mental Health at the University Psychiatric Hospital from 2004 to 2019, where she founded many new departments and received international awards as the best manager. She was the head of the Department of Psychiatry at the Faculty of Medicine of the University of Belgrade. She is a renowned educator and mentor of numerous doctoral dissertations, master’s theses, and subspecialty theses. She was the founder and head of the WHO Collaborating Center for Mental Health Workforce Development and the chair of the National Committee for Mental Health. She made a significant contribution to the reform of mental health care in the country, was the editor of the National Mental Health Strategy, and authored two clinical practice guidelines for depression and schizophrenia. She led several mental health protection programs for refugees and torture victims.
Professor Lečić Toševski is actively involved in the work of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA), as a former zonal representative for Central Europe, former president of the Section on Preventive Psychiatry, and co-chair of the Committee on Scientific Publications, as well as a member of the board of the Section on Psychoanalysis and Psychiatry and several other sections.
She is a distinguished fellow of the American Psychiatric Association (APA), an international member of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, a fellow of the European Psychiatric Association (EPA), an honorary member of the WPA, president of the Association of Psychiatrists of Eastern Europe and the Balkans, and a former president of the Serbian Psychiatric Association. She was a member of the WHO Working Group for the classification of personality disorders in the ICD-11 system.
Prof. Dušica Lečić Toševski has been a coordinator and researcher in many international, multicentric, and national research projects. She is the author of numerous scientific articles and chapters in international books, one of the editors of the new American textbook (Tasman’s Psychiatry, fifth edition, Springer Publishing), two international books, four books published by the Serbian Academy of Sciences, as well as many practical manuals. She is a member of the editorial board and a reviewer for numerous international journals. She gives invited lectures at many international congresses and universities, some of which she has organized. She has translated seven professional and six literary works.
Professor Lečić Toševski’s professional interests include personality disorders, affective disorders, traumatic stress, and the comorbidity of mental and somatic disorders. She has dedicated her professional life to the noble discipline of psychiatry, focusing on person-centered treatment of mental disorders, as well as the prevention of mental disorders and the promotion of mental health.