Meet the Team

Hello! I'm the acting chief medical officer for The Jewish Board and a psychiatrist providing evaluations, consultations and medication management at the Brooklyn REAL PROS and Seymour Askin Counseling Center. I've been working here for about ten years and love the warm, friendly environment here. BKCC is a really special place because it provides an opportunity for clients to get an array of services all under one roof.

My favorite part of my work with clients is the moment the client realizes that I am really interested in understanding their goals and dreams and developing a partnership to come up with a realistic plan to achieve these goals and overcome any barriers.

BKCC is special because it is a single point of access for so many Jewish Board services. This allows our membership to connect to have many of their needs met in one place. What else is special about BKCC is that the leadership openly communicates with each other and supports each other on a peer and professional level.

The tip I would give a new person to the field of social work is to network and work collaboratively with your network. Without having strong collaborative relationships with clients and other service providers it is hard to succeed professionally and help your clients. It is a disservice to the client to work in a silo. No one person can address every need of a client.

We are a multidisciplinary psychiatric rehabilitation team that includes a psychiatrist, psychiatric nurse practitioner, and a registered nurse, all working with Case Associates, Social Workers, and Vocational staff to support all our participants in achieving their psychiatric rehabilitation goals.

Fun fact: When I want to give a room in my house a facelift, but I don't want to spend too much money, I enjoy taking old, tired-looking furniture and refinishing it. Sanding it down, choosing a new color, problem-solving some of the quirks that the piece might present, like stopping the resin of the original stain or wood from bleeding through to the new color, are all very satisfying parts of the process. Painting or staining a new color is so absorbing and therapeutic! All I want to emphasize here is that when it's all done, and you have a "brand new" looking furniture, it's gratifying, and my bank account didn't have to take a big hit!

As the program director of the Brooklyn ACT team within Brooklyn Connected Care, I oversee a multidisciplinary team to ensure that the approach is always person centered and recovery based. Often, clients can feel lost and overwhelmed when seeking treatment and knowing that I am a part of giving them a place that they can go to and get guidance on the next steps, all under one roof makes feel proud of the work that I and my team does!

Part of what we teach at ACT is learning how to practice wellness and selfcare. For example, I like to relax with a good book. My favorite book is "The Count of Monte Cristo" - I love the classics and when I was first introduced to that genre, this is the book that I read. I love how lost I can get in this book no matter how many times I read it.

Logistical planning has always been one of my nerdiest traits. I love taking a deep dive into processes and uncovering how to make them better. Being a new member of the BKCC team what I find to be the most fascinating is the level of care and concern that teams pour into building policy!

On the rare occasion that I find a little extra time on my hands I enjoy being outdoors. This may come as a surprise to some but I’m pretty adventurous! From tandem skydives to wild white-water rafting, even a deep-sea dive at 120 feet (I can’t swim) I have managed to live to tell the stories!

As a data-driven person, what I find most exciting about BKCC is the ability to monitor our progress in real time and provide that information back to clinicians and participants.

My role allows me to develop ways to measure a variety of outcomes and work collaboratively with staff to share program strengths, trends, and areas in need of improvement.