Dr. Ezra Susser is Co-Director of the Columbia University Center for Homeless Prevention Studies. Dr. Susser is Professor of Epidemiology and Psychiatry, and Chairman of the Department of Epidemiology at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. He is also the Department Head of Epidemiology of Brain Disorders at the New York State Psychiatric Institute, Co-Director of Statistics and Epidemiology at the HIV Center for Clinical and Behavior Studies and Director of the Center for Developmental Origins of Health. Dr. Susser’s research on homelessness and mental illness includes both epidemiologic investigations and intervention development. He has also conducted significant work on the epidemiology of schizophrenia. Dr. Susser’s work on the homeless mentally ill includes a controlled trial of an intervention (Critical Time Intervention) to link chronically homeless severely and persistently mentally ill men to community based housing and support services. Another effort concerned the development of a HIV risk prevention intervention for the same constituency. Dr. Susser has published numerous scientific articles of the epidemiology and schizophrenia and homelessness, including a national household survey of homeless prevalence in collaboration with Dr. Bruce Link.

Area of expertise
Psychiatric epidemiology, schizophrenia, homelessness; intervention research

Selected publications
Susser E, Valencia E, Conover S, Felix A, Tsai WY, Wyatt RJ. (1997) Preventing recurrent homelessness among mentally ill men: A “critical time” intervention after discharge from a shelter. Am J Public Health 87:256-262.
Susser E, Valencia E, Conover S. (1993) Prevalence of HIV infection among psychiatric patients in a New York City men’s shelter. Am J Public Health 83:568-570.
Susser E, Lin SP, Conover SA. (1991). Risk factors for homelessness among patients admitted to a state mental hospital. Am J Psychiatry 148(12):1659-1664.
Susser E, Moore R, Link B. (1993) Risk factors for homelessness. Am J Epidemiology 15(2):546-556.
Susser E, Struening E. (1990) Diagnosis and screening for psychotic disorders in a study of the homeless. Schizophrenia Bulletin 16: 133-45.