© Hilde Braet
Michael Portzky is a psychologist specialized in neuropsychology and psychodiagnostics, focusing on mental resilience in adolescents and adults.
Michael Portzky graduated from Ghent University as a clinical psychologist, where he completed two majors: psychoanalysis and experiential client-centered therapy. However, he later specialized in neuropsychology and psychodiagnostics.
Currently, he is part-time affiliated with the Ghent psychiatric hospital ‘Gent-Sleidinge’, where he is responsible for all diagnostics. Furthermore, he worked for several years in residential care facilities and nursing homes, where he is still connected on an outpatient basis for both diagnostics and training/support of staff and family members of residents. He also worked in palliative care at a day center in Ostend, is a recognized forensic expert in psychodiagnostics, and is affiliated with several universities of applied sciences where he primarily teaches about dementia and diagnostics, as well as within the postgraduate program in Psychodiagnostics for Adults.
He is also the author of all validated and standardized Dutch-language questionnaires regarding Mental Resilience in adolescents and adults, as well as the ‘Palliative Pallet Scale’, contributed to the new version of the government’s ‘Fit In Your Head’ website to assess mental health, and is the author of the books ‘Resilience’ and ‘Youth Resilience’. Due to this pioneering position in the Dutch-speaking field regarding mental resilience and risk assessment in areas such as burnout, depression, or suicide, he is also involved with several organizations responsible for the diagnosis, treatment, and/or prevention of burnout, and he is increasingly being asked to conduct risk analyses regarding burnout among employees within companies.