Srinagar: Dr. Afifa Qazi, an alumna of Govt Medical College Srinagar, has been honored with the “Psychiatrist of the Year 2022” award by the Royal College of Psychiatrists, London.
It is a highly competitive prize awarded to individuals for their outstanding contributions to mental health.
Dr. Qazi graduated from the Govt Medical College, Srinagar in 1995 and moved to the UK where she pursued a career in Psychiatry. She is currently working as the Chief Medical Officer for a large mental health organization in Kent and Medway, UK. She has made significant, and high-impact contributions to mental health services in the UK. Over the years, Dr. Qazi has received numerous awards in recognition of her work, including the Academic Health Science Network Health Innovation Award for her work in dementia (2014), and the HSJ award (2016), the most esteemed accolade of healthcare service excellence in the UK.
Dr. Qazi developed an innovative and highly successful model of community care for dementia which reduces hospital admissions and the length of stay for people suffering from that disorder. Her work has received recognition from the Department of Health in the UK, and internationally from healthcare organizations in other countries, e.g. Japan, which sent a team to the UK to study her methods and replicate them in their services.
She is a sought-after speaker at national and International conferences in Psychiatry and has numerous peer-reviewed publications in prestigious academic journals to her credit.
Dr. Qazi is working on setting up a partnership with her fellow professionals in Kashmir to share good practices, and offer her support to continuing professional development and innovation in healthcare service delivery.
