Above all, I embrace my role as a healer. As such, I am interested helping the whole person, and improving quality of life physically and mentally. I have a niche in improving the mental health in those with co-occurring medical illnesses as well as those who are family planning, pregnant or postpartum. I also treat general psychiatric illnesses such as depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, schizoaffective disorder, substance use disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), and women’s issues.

I realized during my training that psychiatric medication and seeing a mental health specialist is only one part of healing the mind. In order to truly feel your best, one must consider other things that are put into the body: FOOD!

We often forget how important good nutrition is for us to function at our best. In our environment, it is easy to obtain calories, but not easy to obtain food with high nutritional value. I can recommend individual food, nutraceutical, and lifestyle plans tailored to your specific needs.

I currently practice telehealth in California; I am physically based in Oakland. I earned my Bachelor’s degree in Biopsychology at Mills College in 2006 and then attended medical school at University of California, San Francisco. After earning my Medical Degree in 2011, I trained at University of Southern California + Los Angeles County for residency and finished in 2015. Since graduating residency, I have worked as a psychiatrist in clinics and hospitals. In recent years, I have specifically focused on working with individuals with co-occurring medical illnesses and the interaction of the physical illnesses with mental illnesses (though physical and mental illness are often separated arbitrarily since we are actually integrated human beings).

My interest in nutritional and lifestyle health comes from my personal battle with chronic illness that I am able to manage with both medications and nutritional and lifestyle changes. In addition, I spent a lot of time in the hospital as a student and as a physician. Over time, I started to look at what patients were being fed and realized our nation’s standard healthcare system does not even provide or value nutrition in a way that will aid in healing. I realized I wanted my patients to have access to nutritional knowledge, so I began my journey to add nutritional psychiatry into my practice for optimal outcomes.