My background

Dr. C was born and raised in rural Northeast Pennsylvania. Dr. C was fortunate to have an upbringing where her parents who had grown up in low-income, mixed-race families strongly instilled the value of education and experiential learning.   During her child and adolescent years, she was encouraged to explore who she was, and why. This would frequently involve learning from each of her lineages including: European, Japanese, and African-American,. These experiences laid an invaluable foundation for balancing scientific knowledge with open-minded learning of holistic approaches.

Dr. C completed her undergraduate education at Ursinus College, receiving a bachelor’s degree in Biology, and Spanish minor.  She completed medical school at Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey, Pennsylvania. While in medical school Dr. C researched associations between sleep and suicide in adolescents and young adults. For Dr. C, that experience solidified her desire to find a role in medicine where engaging a patients’ life narrative was essential to being an effective healer.  During her last year of medical school she lived in Tucson, Arizona for a month long training on alternative and complementary medicine at the University of Arizona. Through this ardent and transformative training, Dr. C acquired a profound appreciation for the depths of healing possible when combining conventional western medicine with other ancient forms of traditional healing.  

In the summer of 2014, Dr. C relocated across the county to complete her Psychiatry residency at UCLA. She was inspired and moved by the multidimensional communities and immense diversity within Los Angeles and made her feel right at home.  During residency, Dr. C took a vested interest in employee burnout, and created monthly wellness initiatives integrating practices like meditation, yoga, and pet therapy for her colleagues. Dr. C’s research interests during residency included creating online tools to foster resident agency and investigating supplementation practices in MDMA users. Following residency Dr. C, completed her psychiatry board certification by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (2018). 

Post-residency, Dr. C, completed two fellowships.  Her first fellowship at UCLA specializing in complex pharmacology for Mood disorders.  Her second fellowship  through the Academy of Integrated Health and Medicine allowed her to complete her second board certification in Integrative Medicine through the American Board of Physician Specialities. 

For Dr. C,  pursuing additional training opportunities is rooted in her strong belief that the more tools a doctor has, the more solutions a patient can have.  For this reason, she went on to complete two additional trainings in ketamine administration (2019) followed by a certification in Ketamine/Psychedelic Assisted psychotherapy (2021).