APRN, PMHNP-BC

I help adults who are living with neurodivergence along with its' mood and medical complications as well as depression, anxiety, OCD, bipolar disorder, PTSD, C-PTSD, who are open to integrative evidenced-based treatments to reduce or resolve their concerning symptoms, feel more confident, and live a healthier life.  My own mental health journey is informed by successfully managing my own inattentive type ADHD and connective tissue disorder without the need for traditional pharmaceuticals. 

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I am a fully licensed, ANCC board-certified, psychiatric and mental health nurse practitioner with over 10 years experience in mental health. My education includes a Master's in Nursing from the University of Illinois at Chicago and a Master's degree in Clinical Psychology from Eastern Illinois University. I currently serve as a preceptor for Rush University's DNP program in the psychiatric specialty and as a peer-reviewer for the Journal of Psychosocial Nursing.  

I am also currently a fellow through Psychiatry Re-defined headed by Dr. James Greenblatt who is a nationally recognized thought leader in functional psychiatry. ​I have worked in a variety of traditional psychiatric treatment settings. These include inpatient psychiatric hospitals, psychiatric services for medically hospitalized patients (a.k.a., psychosomatic medicine or consult liaison psychiatry), in-person outpatient psychiatry, and telehealth outpatient psychiatry.

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Why  Integrative and Functional Psychiatry?

In 2010, the NIMH (National Institutes of Mental Health) stopped funding research based on DSM-5 diagnostic categories in favor of research that studies  novel mechanisms of dysfunction. Thomas Insel, former director of NIMH writes "Diagnostic categories based on clinical consensus fail to align with findings emerging from clinical neuroscience and genetics. The boundaries of these categories have not been predictive of treatment response. And, perhaps most important, these categories, based upon presenting signs and symptoms, may not capture fundamental underlying mechanisms of dysfunction. One consequence has been to slow the development of new treatments targeted to underlying pathophysiological mechanisms" (Insel et al., 2010). Therefore, "treatment as usual" is not only out of date with cutting edge research, but may be of limited benefit and/or an imprecise treatment as most psychotropic medication treatments are based on clinical presentations of symptoms as outlined by DSM diagnostic categories.  

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While mental illness is still conceptualized by researchers as a Bio-Psycho-Social phenomenon, we are living in a revolution in understanding of the biological  underpinnings of mental illness. Kaplan et al. (2015) writes,  "The current revolution is broader, consisting of the rapidly accumulating knowledge of how inflammation, microbiome imbalance (gut dysbiosis), oxidative stress, and impaired mitochondrial output affect brain function. Suitable interventions for fighting inflammation, restoring normal gut function, reducing oxidative stress, and improving mitochondrial metabolism incorporate lifestyle variables, including nutrients and probiotics. 

References

Insel, T., Cuthbert, B., Garvey, M., Heinssen, R., Pine, D. S., Quinn, K., Sanislow, C., & Wang, P. (2010). Research domain criteria (rdoc): Toward a new classification framework for research on Mental Disorders. American Journal of Psychiatry, 167(7), 748–751. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ajp.2010.09091379

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Kaplan, B. J., Rucklidge, J. J., Romijn, A., & McLeod, K. (2015). The Emerging Field of Nutritional Mental Health: Inflammation, the Microbiome, Oxidative Stress, and Mitochondrial Function. Clinical Psychological Science, 3(6), 964–980. https://doi.org/10.1177/2167702614555413

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