Treatment: Psychotherapies

Rebecca Hendrickson

The Hendrickson research group explores underlying biological mechanisms related to the development and maintenance of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and related conditions, including mild traumatic brain injury, as well as the potential for interaction between different types of stress and trauma. Through the design and implementation of translational clinical studies, we apply this work directly to the pursuit of new treatment options for people who have experienced a traumatic stress.

A primary goal of our team is to understand broadly the ways traumatic stress interferes with people’s lives, and to prioritize the areas of greatest clinical need. We look for ways to prevent persistent symptoms after trauma, to match patients more quickly to the treatment options that will be most effective for them as individuals, and to develop new treatment options for those for whom current options are simply not adequate.

In addition to my research work, I am a staff psychiatrist in the VA PTSD Outpatient Clinic and a member of the VA Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) Team, and provide teaching and mentorship for residents in the UW Psychiatry Training Program.

Jessica Jenness

Dr. Jenness is a clinical child psychologist and Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington. She earned her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Denver in 2015. Her past research includes NIMH-funded studies on the neural and behavioral changes that predict treatment response to behavioral activation for depressed adolescents (K23/NARSAD).  As the director of the Adolescent Depression and Intervention Innovations (ADII) lab, her recent work focuses on innovative digital treatment approaches to improve adolescent depression care. Current projects include 1) adapting behavioral activation to an online platform, ActivaTeen (R03, NIMH R34); 2) leveraging paraprofessional coaching of video-guided depression care (Garvey Innovation Grant); and 3) developing and testing a digital just-in-time adaptive intervention (Sidekick; NIMH R61) as a first-step adolescent depression treatment within primary care settings. In addition to research, Dr. Jenness is an Attending Psychologist in the Mood and Anxiety Disorders Program at Seattle Children’s Hospital where she primarily treats adolescent depression and suicide. She has also trained mental health professionals at various sites around the US in the use of behavioral activation with adolescents.

Elizabeth McCauley

Personal Statement

I am a developmental and child clinical psychologist actively engaged in a clinical and research program designed to characterize the development, course, and management of clinical depression in young people.  My colleagues and I are engaged in a series of research investigations documenting the developmental pathways of youth with depressive disorders and co-occurring conduct problems, testing the efficacy of a brief intervention, assessment and engagement approach for school-based for school based providers, and adapting and testing behavioral activation as a therapy for depressed adolescents. I am also engaged in a randomized control study assessing the efficacy of Dialectical Behavior Therapy as a treatment for youth with suicidal ideation and behaviors.

I have been actively involved with national and local efforts to disseminate training in evidenced based treatment strategies to child mental health care providers and is currently working with King County Public Health and local school districts to provide training and consultation to school based mental health providers in evidenced based assessment and intervention approaches. In addition to my work focused on depressive disorders, I have extensive experience evaluating and treating children/adolescents and their families who present with a variety of developmental and behavior problems including youth with gender dysphoria and those with disorders of sex development.

Richard Ries

Personal Statement

I am a Professor of Psychiatry and Director of the Addictions Division in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington  School of Medicine in Seattle, Washington. I am also the clinical director of  addictions treatment services at Harborview Medical Center, and work in the psychiatric rehabilitation and recovery services.

I am board-certified in Psychiatry by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology with Added Qualifications in Addiction Psychiatry, and the American Board of Addiction Medicine. A Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and a Fellow of the American Society of Addiction Medicine, I am on the editorial board and a reviewer for several scientific journals and holds a number of research grants from the National Institute of Health.

Robert Hilt

Robert Hilt, MD is a Professor in the UW Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and a psychiatrist at Seattle Children’s Hospital. He is the program director for the Partnership Access Line (PAL), a child mental health consultation service for primary care providers in Washington, Wyoming and Alaska. He is the Program Director for the Medicaid Medication Second Opinion Programs of Wyoming, Washington and Alaska, and Multidisciplinary Team (MDT) Psychiatric Consult Service in Wyoming for children in foster care. He has been involved in several collaborative care projects, in school support projects, and has helped to establish a statewide mental health referral service in Washington.  Dr. Hilt’s primary interest is to increase professional collaboration between child psychiatrists and pediatric medical providers, and to increase access to high quality care.

Eric Hawkins

Personal Statement

I am an investigator in the Seattle-Denver Center of Innovation for Veteran-Centered and Value-Driven Care and Associate Director of the Seattle Center of Excellence in Substance Abuse Treatment and Education (CESATE), one of two national VA centers devoted to improving the quality of care and clinical outcomes of veterans with substance use conditions. I am also a licensed clinical psychologist in Washington State. My primary research interests include evaluating and improving behavioral health and substance use outcomes of Veterans with alcohol and/or drug misuse conditions. I received his PhD from Brigham Young University.

My primary research interests include evaluating and improving behavioral health and substance use outcomes of Veterans with alcohol and/or drug misuse conditions. Ongoing research interests include prevention of alcohol misuse among Veteran populations and development of a collaborative care management intervention for patients with complex, recurrent substance use disorders and high utilization of hospital services. Current projects include evaluating collaborative care management approaches for treating Veterans with complex and chronic substance use disorders, estimating the relative risks of serious adverse events among Veterans with PTSD who are prescribed opioids and benzodiazepines concurrently, evaluating clinical decision support interventions to reduce concurrent use of opioid and benzodiazepine medications among high-risk Veterans and validation of quality indicators for recognition and management of problematic alcohol use, and assessing the recognition and management of alcohol misuse among OEF/OIF Veterans with and without TBI.

Emily Dworkin

Personal Statement

Dr. Dworkin’s research (1) explores how the social, community, and societal contexts in which trauma survivors recover affect their well-being and (2) seeks to find ways to make changes to these contexts to improve outcomes following trauma.

Jennifer Cadigan

Personal Statement

Dr. Cadigan is an Assistant Professor and licensed psychologist in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Missouri in 2016 and then completed clinical psychology internship and fellowship at the University of Washington Medical Center. Her program of research focuses on adolescent and young adult health and wellbeing, with an emphasis on the etiology, prevention, and intervention of substance misuse and co-occurring mental health concerns. This work aims to develop, test, and disseminate innovative prevention and intervention programs to reduce substance misuse and improve mental health among adolescents and young adults. This work has included developing and testing programs for young adults who use substances to cope with negative affect and loneliness. Her work has also examined etiological factors related to co-occurring mental health and substance use, including the effects of loneliness, depression, coping motives, social support, solitary substance use, and factors associated with improving access to mental health care. Clinically, she works with adolescents presenting with depression and suicidality at Seattle Children’s Hospital in the Behavioral Health Crisis Care Clinic and in the Mood and Anxiety Program.  
  • Recent Grants:
    • Development of a behavioral economic intervention with personalized resource allocation feedback to reduce young adult alcohol misuse  (PI: Cadigan, NIH/NIAAA1R34AA029478)
    • Development of an interactive, we-based drinking to cope intervention and tools to assess coping skill utilization (PI: Cadigan, NIH/NIAAA R34AA028074)

Benjamin Buck

Personal Statement

My research is focused on (1) developing innovative mHealth assessments and interventions for schizophrenia-spectrum disorders and cross-diagnostic persecutory ideation, as well as (2) “engagement mHealth,” or the development of mobile health interventions that increase the likelihood that underserved populations present to and receive evidence-based treatment, with a particular focus on young adults at risk for psychosis and their families. My research is supported by a NARSAD Young Investigator Award from the Brain and Behavior Research Foundation and multiple grants from NIMH including a K23 Mentored Patient-Oriented Research Career Development Award.

Prior to my faculty position at UW, I was an Advanced Fellow in VA Health Services Research and Development and the Department of Health Services at UW. I completed my clinical psychology internship at the VA Puget Sound Health Care System, where I was awarded the APA Division 18 Outstanding VA Trainee Award. Prior to internship, I completed my undergraduate and doctoral training at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Throughout my training, I have been dedicated to services for individual with serious mental illness, with experience in an inpatient state hospital, VA psychosocial rehabilitation, intensive outpatient and dual-diagnosis clinics, and in coordinated specialty care for young people with early psychosis.

In addition to my program of research and clinical work, I am committed to clinical supervision and training. I currently lead the development of one of the first clinical training sequences designed for frontline clinicians integrating mHealth into community mental health. I was the first-ever graduate student to win UNC’s David Galinsky Award, an honor recognizing excellence in clinical supervision that had previously only ever been won by faculty. I am currently active in providing supervision in CBT to third-year psychiatry residents at UW.