Ex-U psychiatry chief says he'll retire at year's end

A key figure in the University of Minnesota's crisis over human test-subject protection says he will retire in December.

In the past two months, Dr. Charles Schulz has stepped down both as chief of the U's psychiatry department and as executive director of behavioral health services — moves that follow harsh outside criticism over the way the U has treated vulnerable research patients.

Schulz says the decision to retire was his, and that although the last several months have been stressful, they have played little if any role in his decision.

"I'm going to be turning 70, so I thought it would be time for me to finish up," he said.

Schulz said he discussed retirement with the medical school dean last year.

He says he'll continue to do clinical and academic work until retirement, but will not have any working relationship with the university after that. He said he has not yet decided whether he'll work at another school or company.

Schulz, whose specialty is schizophrenia, has been at the U since 1999, when he left Case Western Reserve University to become head of the U's psychiatry department.

Schulz has been under scrutiny this year. An external review in February said that while he was head, the U's psychiatry department suffered from a "culture of fear" that hindered efforts to improve protections.

In March, he was also a figure in a recent state legislative audit of the 2004 suicide of university drug-trial patient Dan Markingson.

Markingson's mother, Mary Weiss, had warned university researchers — including Schulz — that her son wasn't responding well, and might harm himself. Critics say Schulz did not take her warnings seriously enough.

Schulz says he did not mean to sound unconcerned in his correspondence with her. Although he says he had little involvement in the case as a co-researcher and didn't do anything wrong, he says he wishes he had met with her in person.

"I started doing family therapy for people with schizophrenia back in the 1980s," he said, "and I have a very high sensitivity to wanting to help the moms and dads."