It is with deep sadness that the Child Division and Department of Psychiatry and Biobehavioral Sciences announces the passing of Jennifer Levitt, MD, Professor-In-Residence, after a long illness battled with great determination. Dr. Levitt exemplified the modern academic child psychiatrist, effortlessly blending warm, compassionate, and expert clinical skill, her deep knowledge of neuroscience, and commitment to teaching, with kindness extended to all around her. As a key faculty member in the Child Division, she will be sorely missed by all.
Dr. Levitt was born in Augsburg, Germany. She grew up in a medical family, following the footsteps of her father, who had a long distinguished career as an academic radiation oncologist. She attended Carleton College as an undergraduate, and received her MD from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she also completed an internship. At UNC, she worked in the laboratory of Thomas Gualtieri, a pediatric psychopharmacologist, getting her first taste of child mental health research, which became her career-long passion. From there she traveled to California, completing a residency in psychiatry at Stanford and a research fellowship, followed by a child psychiatry clinical and research fellowship at UCLA.
Dr. Levitt joined the faculty in 1994, and UCLA remained her only academic home, despite being recruited for leadership positions across the country. Dr. Levitt was the 1st member of UCLA child psychiatry faculty to embrace brain MRI neuroimaging as a research methodology in the 1990âs to try to understand both normal development and child neuropsychiatric disorders, starting with her receiving a prestigious NIMH âKâ career development award and going on to lead and collaborate on multiple NIH funded projects during her 28-year career on faculty. This included the seminal NIH MRI Study of Brain Development, and other studies of the neurobiology of ADHD, autism, OCD, prenatal alcohol exposure and epilepsy described in over 90 publications.
She received the Beatrix Hamburg Award from the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (AACAP), and was active nationally in the AACAP Committee on Autism and in the International Molecular Genetic Study of Autism Consortium. As a sensitive and master clinician, Dr. Levitt was active clinically throughout her career, including serving as Medical Director of the Child Day Treatment Program for many years, as well as joining the Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) program as an attending psychiatrist. Her colleagues and the Department mourn her passing but will remember her many selfless accomplishments, gentle disposition, wry humor, courage and important place in the history of the Child Psychiatry Division during her nearly 30 year tenure.
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