President

Kristin Van Zant

Dr. Kristin Van Zant is the current President of the Pennsylvania Society of Addiction Medicine. Following graduation from the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine, she has been an award-winning leader in Community Psychiatry for more than 30 years. She has held leadership positions in non-profit organizations, including Medical Director of Horizon House, where she also was Co-Director of UPENN’s Public Psychiatric Fellowship program.

She has participated in every level of community support, including ACT teams and Housing First models of care. She was active in Philadelphia’s transformation of community mental health services and a champion in Philadelphia’s integration of Tobacco Recovery within Behavioral Health Services, receiving the Wayne Chiodo Leadership Award in 2015. Her advocacy for homeless individuals with severe and complex health concerns led to participation in the Mayor’s Opioid Task Force, Board Certification in Addiction Medicine, and a transition to innovative programming in Philadelphia’s highest opioid overdose zip codes, where she provided clinical care to thousands of individuals in PHMC’s MAT partial program and IOP’s. 

As Chief Medical Officer of COMHAR, she was an advocate for increasing MOUD within OP programs and building a continuum of supports for dual-diagnosis individuals. Currently, she is the Medical Director of the Integrated Care and Wellness at NET-Centers, a type of CCBHC where there is an active OBOT that supports individuals in drug treatment court and making a transition from prison. She has provided supervision for Temple, Jefferson, Drexel, and UPENN medical students and residents and received an MC / Drexel resident teaching award. She is Vice President of the Philadelphia Psychiatric Society and is active with Women Advancing Addiction Medicine and the Women’s Committee of the Pennsylvania Psychiatric Society. She has also received the Pennsauken Life Saving Award for CPR to a citizen. ♦