Allison Empey, MD, is a pediatrician in a tribal clinic run and operated by the Confederated Tribes of Grand Ronde, where she has created an accepting practice for her fellow indigenous patients. She is also an Assistant Professor in pediatrics at Oregon Health & Science University and actively mentors underrepresented medical students and residents. With her teaching platform and deep community work, she will use her REACH training not only with her own patients but also to educate her students and colleagues. 

Beth Heuer, NP, is a pediatric nurse practitioner and behavioral health care specialist at a pediatric clinic in Philadelphia, PA, where most patients are on Medicaid and local families have limited healthcare access. She will use her REACH training to expand mental health services for her patients. She will also educate nursing students at Temple University, where she is a nursing professor, and increase awareness among her colleagues in the National Association of Pediatric Nurse Practitioners. 

Nuriva Kamran, DO, is a pediatric resident in Baton Rouge, LA, where most patients are on Medicaid. As a first-generation, bilingual Bangladeshi American, she aspires to provide thoughtful, patient-centered, and inclusive healthcare to diverse and underserved patients. She aims to share what she learns at REACH with other pediatric providers in her hospital and community through one-to-one outreach, small group meetings, lectures, social media, and creating culturally sensitive materials. 

Priyanka Kawali, MD, is a pediatrician in Federal Way, WA, where most patients are immigrants or from other underserved populations. Coming from an immigrant background herself, and being proficient in three languages, she works hard to create a safe space for patients and their families where they can open up about topics like mental health and gender identity. REACH training will enable her to even better serve her patients and increase awareness about children’s mental health through community outreach. 

Kristin Lucas, MD, is a pediatrician in a Federally Qualified Health Center in Harvey, IL. As part of her commitment to equity in mental health care, she conducts mental health screenings and referrals when performing school physicals as part of her urban clinic’s mobile operations. She hopes to use her new REACH training to further break down mental health stigma in communities of color and get the word out about free pediatric mental health resources for local residents. 

Manasi Madiwale, MD, is the Director of Pediatrics for a network of Federally Qualified Health Centers in rural central California. Proficient in four languages, she is an advocate for improving healthcare access for immigrant children and families in her community. With REACH resources, she hopes to promote awareness of pediatric mental health services and trauma-informed care among those serving local immigrant communities. 

Finnian Steele, DO, is a Navy veteran and pediatrician in Fresno, CA, where they are the only general pediatrician providing supportive care for transgender and gender-diverse children and youth. With REACH training, they aim to educate providers in sibling clinics to increase children’s mental health care access throughout the community. They are also working to start a dedicated gender clinic that will provide mental health care as a part of a holistic approach to gender-affirming care for children and teens.

Katie Queen, MD, is a pediatrician in rural Covington, LA, and a faculty member for the state’s Provider-to-Provider Consultation Line, which offers providers free pediatric and perinatal mental health consultations. She is also advocating to create an integrated behavioral health pediatric clinic within her statewide health system. With her REACH training, Katie is committed to growing her behavioral health skills and mentoring providers across Louisiana. 

Aryan Sharif, DO, is a family physician resident at a Federally Qualified Health Center in Caldwell, ID. He also volunteers extensively in the local community and at pediatric medical camps. Practicing in a region where pediatric mental health providers are few and far between, he will use his REACH training to expand his own clinical services and empower his colleagues. He hopes to help more family physicians embrace, rather than shy away from, providing children’s mental health services. 

Irene Chern, MD, is a pediatric resident in Philadelphia, PA, where most of her patients are on Medicaid, and is conducting research related to children’s mental health and chronic illness. Certified as a multilingual clinician in Spanish and Mandarin Chinese, she is committed to mentoring the next generation of healthcare professionals. To improve access to mental health care for as many children as possible, she will apply her REACH training to her work as a practitioner and mentor. She will also use her research to illuminate pediatric mental health access and outcomes. 

Mahoussi Aholoukpe, MD, is a pediatrician from Annville, PA, working in a clinic with a high population of first-generation immigrants from Latin America. An immigrant herself, Dr. Aholoukpe can relate to the experiences of her patient population and her goal is to further understand the barriers they face when seeking mental health services. She hopes to become a valuable mental health resource in her community after her REACH training.

Sabita Bhatta, MD, is a pediatrician from Visalia, CA, who works in a rural Federally Qualified Health Center where most children have to wait more than six months to see a mental health care provider. Dr. Bhatta intends to use her REACH training to decrease the fragmentation of care and poor healthcare outcomes due to loss of follow-up.

Mikki Bouquet, MD, is a pediatrician in Baton Rouge, LA, where more than 75% of her patients are enrolled in Medicaid. Dr. Bouquet looks to this REACH training to improve her knowledge and comfort in prescribing medications and managing mental health care independently to provide more comprehensive care to her patients. She intends to share her learnings with medical residents and colleagues alike.

Noor Hajjaj, MD, a pediatric resident at a Federally Qualified Health Center in Baton Rouge, LA, is dedicated to improving mental health resources in her community. Dr. Hajjaj plans to use her REACH training to increase mental health education and awareness among families, daycare providers, and schoolteachers.

Naziat Hassan, LMHC, LPC, a mental health clinician in Queens Village, NY, works with a high proportion of LGBTQIA youth. Naziat’s REACH training objective is to expand psychoeducation initiatives focused on children’s mental health care and strengthen her ability to treat ADHD, anxiety, and depression.

Melissa Holland, DO, a pediatrician in Baton Rouge, LA, works in a largely diverse community. Dr. Holland wants to use her REACH training to enhance her screening practices for depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation, as well as learn more about behavior disorders.

Avis Johnson-Smith, NP, is a nurse practitioner in Albany, GA. Avis grew up in South Georgia in a predominantly Black community and has already established her own clinic to improve the health and well-being of the people that live there. She is now looking to expand her service to this community by using her REACH training to increase access to mental health care for children at local preschools and churches.

Joseph Mason Kent, PA-C, is a pediatric hematology and oncology physician’s assistant in Baton Rouge, LA. In addition to looking after his patients’ medical needs, Joseph would like to use his REACH training to manage some of the mental health needs of his underserved patients, given the lack of resources in the community. He hopes to start support groups for his oncology and sickle cell patients and their families.

Lilian Mekhail, MD, is a developmental and behavioral pediatrician from Monmouth Junction, NJ. Dr. Mekhail specializes in neurodevelopmental disabilities and hopes to increase her knowledge and confidence in treating the commonly co-occurring mental health conditions in her patients to minimize the need for families to seek additional providers.

Jurido Olukunle, MD, a pediatric resident at SUNY Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, NY, serves a large percentage of children who are BIPOC and enrolled in Medicaid. Jurido hopes to use her REACH training to identify children in her practice that are at risk and may need additional mental health support.

Diana Pontell, MD, is a bilingual pediatrician in Philadelphia, PA who speaks Spanish in over 75% of her patient encounters. Dr. Pontell wants to use her REACH training to continue to help deliver care to underserved and immigrant children and families.

Margaret Sease, PA-C, a bilingual physician’s assistant in North Charleston, SC, works with an extremely under-resourced community. Margaret is determined to use her REACH training to provide access to mental health services for students in rural South Carolina through school-based health telemedicine.

Daphne Sharpe, NP, is a nurse practitioner, and assistant professor of nursing in Winston-Salem, NC. Daphne also works with her local public health department and school nurses who often see children with unmet behavioral health needs. She plans to use her REACH training to provide mental health support to the vulnerable children in her area.

Omar Syed, MD, a first-year resident in Boise, ID, has a strong passion for integrating mental health care into the primary care setting. Dr. Syed’s goal for his REACH training is to expand coverage for his patients, who can wait months to be seen by a mental health professional.

Tanner Walsh, MD, is a pediatrician serving Chester, PA, a highly under-resourced community where over a third of the population lives in poverty. Dr. Walsh, who is fluent in Spanish, aims to use her REACH training to treat her patients dealing with anxiety, depression, and ADHD. She also intends to share this knowledge with her partners and the residents and medical students she precepts.

Quynh Nguyen, DO, works in a pediatric outpatient clinic in Newtown, PA. Herself a refugee, she knows the immigrant experience firsthand and understands why many immigrants are reluctant to accept mental health care. She wants to use her position as families’ trusted doctor to provide mental health treatment based on current guidelines.

Zahra Younes, MD (Gephart Scholar) is chief pediatric resident in a Bronx, New York, healthcare system. Her goals for REACH training are to learn to diagnose and treat common mental health conditions and to identify community resources for mental health care. Having earned her medical degree in Bolivia, she is fluent in both Spanish and English.

Gagandeep Singh, DO (Gephart Scholar) is a resident in family medicine in Minneapolis, Minnesota. They are passionate about providing mental health care for vulnerable young people, including children of Somali and Afghan immigrants. Their clinic is known as the Twin Cities’ center for transgender health; trauma-informed care is another focus of their practice.

Matthew Sall, MD (Gephart Scholar), a pediatrician in Indianapolis, Indiana, plans to use his REACH training to treat patients with mental health conditions within his practice rather than referring them out. As a preceptor to residents, he plans to disseminate what he learns to new pediatricians and, ultimately, to other physicians in his clinic.

Shawna McCafferty, MD (Gephart Scholar) is a developmental / behavioral pediatrician in Charleston, South Carolina. She intends to use her REACH training not only to support her own patients with culturally responsive care but also to improve community outreach to other pediatricians and to train pediatric residents in managing mental health medications.

Ramandeep Kaur, MD, a pediatrician in Fresno, California, is eager to use her ability to speak Punjabi and Hindi to provide mental health care for the growing populations of speakers of those languages. Herself the child of immigrants, she is sensitive to the barriers immigrants can face in obtaining health care.

Deepali Jain, MD, is a pediatrician serving vulnerable populations in Livingston, New Jersey. She wants to provide timely assessment and culturally sensitive care to patients from diverse backgrounds who have limited access to mental and developmental health care. She speaks Urdu and Hindi as well as English.

Traci Doherty, NP (Gephart Scholar) is a family nurse practitioner in Boston, Massachusetts, where she provides clinical services to families and adolescents who do not have permanent housing. She wants to deepen her ability to support vulnerable patients who struggle with mental health disorders, perhaps including partnership with a pediatrician to provide psychopharmacology as needed.

Venkata Sushma Chamarthi, MD, practices pediatrics in a rural area near Visalia, California. Though she routinely screens patients for mental health conditions and adverse childhood events, she cannot typically refer them for psychiatric treatment because the wait time is more than a year. She is eager to learn to treat ADHD, depression, and anxiety.

Caneita Bosley, MD, is a pediatrician in a community health center in Houston, Texas. Most of her patients come from low-income or immigrant urban families; one of her clinics has a large LGBTQ population and offers transgender medicine. She is interested in learning to treat patients with ADHD, depression, and anxiety.

Helen Wang, MD, teaches pediatric medicine at a university medical school in San Diego, CA. As she uses her REACH training in her clinical practice, she intends to serve as a model to her residents of how to care for children’s mental health needs. She also plans to facilitate workshops for community and faculty physicians.

Miguel G. Sánchez Acosta, MD, is a pediatric attending physician and associate director of pediatric residency at a Bronx, NY, hospital. He plans to become the “go-to” pediatrician for mental health conditions and eventually to share his REACH training with his peers so all can comfortably treat common mental health disorders.

Matthew Rivera, MD, is a family physician in Rochester, NY, with training in integrative medicine. His fluency in Spanish enables him to connect with the immigrant families in his practice. He uses his training as a lay minister to address spiritual concerns that affect and are affected by physical and mental health.

Hina Patel, MD, cares for patients from underserved and immigrant populations in a pediatric clinic in Baton Rouge, LA, where she also teaches residents. She wants not only to become more comfortable prescribing for mental health disorders but also to help residents care for patients with no other access to mental health services.

Payal Maniar, MD, runs a private pediatric clinic in East Orange, NJ, where most patients are on Medicaid. She plans to use her REACH training to diagnose and treat ADHD, evaluate patients for depression and anxiety and begin treatment as appropriate, and work with families of children with developmental delays

Juniper Lee-Park, MD, is a pediatrician in Harleysville, PA. Her experience as a middle school teacher gives her a unique understanding of how to work with schools. She speaks four of the many languages of families at her rural clinic and plans to develop mental health education materials in families’ languages.

Gina Labovitz, MD, is a pediatrician in a rural area near Lexington, KY, a community with one of the highest opioid addiction rates in the country. Her goal for REACH training is to offer mental health treatment to victims of addiction–whether their own or someone else’s–and other adverse childhood events.

La Carla Holmes, NP, is a psychiatric nurse practitioner in a mental health clinic in Rochester, NY. She aims to use her REACH training to improve family education on mental health issues and to increase access to mental health care for pediatric patients.

Emily Hall, DO, has long served pediatric patients on or near tribal lands in rural areas of Montana and elsewhere. She plans to use her REACH training not only to serve her own patients but also to be a resource for other pediatricians and to advocate for mental health training for providers statewide.

Bess Griffin, FNP-C, is a family nurse practitioner in Rochester, NY. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, she traveled the country as a crisis intensive care nurse. She is particularly interested in improving her ability to treat patients dealing with the physical and mental health consequences of abuse.

Courtney Campbell, MD, is an associate program director in a pediatric academic center in Baton Rouge, LA, where she cares for a diverse, largely low-income population of patients. She has detailed plans both for using her REACH knowledge and for passing it on to the students and residents in her practice.

Traci Cameron, PNP, provides pediatric care and precepts nurse practitioner students in a rural health center in Jacksonville, TX. Having worked in this clinic for 11 years, she has developed trusting relationships with families, which will help when she uses her REACH training to help patients suffering from mental health conditions.

Daniela Borecky, MD, is a resident in family medicine at in a university medical center in Murrieta, CA. As a first-generation immigrant from an economically disadvantaged background, she is sensitive to the needs of her diverse and low-income patients. She plans to share her REACH learning with her fellow residents.

Ghizlane Benchekroune, MD, is the medical director for pediatrics at a family health center in the Austin area. An immigrant herself, she feels her diverse patients and families trust her to respect their needs. She wants to develop her confidence in using the right tools to treat patients with mental health issues

Marie Akers, APRN, is a pediatric nurse practitioner in Tampa, FL. Even before applying for the REACH scholarship, she was collaborating on a program to integrate mental health into pediatric primary care. She is hoping to increase the number of children with mental health needs her practice can treat, including through telehealth.

Alicia Adams, MD, describes herself as “a community-based family doc with a passion for mental health.” Her safety-net clinic in rural central Washington is three hours from the nearest mental health center, which has a long waiting list for Medicaid patients. Though she has become “reasonably comfortable” in treating adults with mental health issues, she wants to learn to help younger patients too.

Raquel Botto, MD, is a family physician in a Toronto clinic where 90% of the families are refugees. Parents and children alike suffer from mental health issues resulting from trauma and displacement; income, language, and lack of access are barriers to care. Dr. Botto plans to use her ability to speak Portuguese, Spanish, and Italian, languages common in the clinic’s population, to treat young patients’ mental health issues.

Moshe Kupferstein, DO, is a pediatrician in a clinic in Monroe, NY, most of whose patients are on Medicaid. From the beginning, his practice has included a mental health focus. He wrote, “Reassuring parents that a child’s OCD doesn’t make them a bad parent, following up on school issues — those are factors that . . . take time to do right. But that’s why we became doctors.”

Rayanne Lee-House, MD, is a pediatrician in New Orleans. Losing her teenage nephew to suicide spurred her interest in helping young people with mental health issues. She notes that “the wait time to see a mental health therapist can be a hindrance to care” and that she is in a good position to treat her patients because she has already established rapport with them.

Joanne Martin, NP, works in a child development center in New York City and has served as adjunct faculty for several nursing programs. She wants use her REACH training to improve outcomes for her own patients, share her knowledge with colleagues, and educate parents and the public about the benefits of early mental health intervention.

Amber Pendleton, MD, is a pediatrician and clinical professor in the University of Louisville’s primary care clinic, which has been integrating a mental health focus. She says that the REACH program would “hugely impact” training for physicians, residents, and medical students; “we have struggled find a curriculum that helps us take care of the intense needs of our diverse, urban families of color.”

Andrea Ryan, NP, works in a Chicago-area hospital, where she cites “a desperate need” for pediatric mental health care. The wait is so long that many patients never are seen. NP Ryan said that her own family history of mental illness helps her understand patients’ needs. She looks forward to being able to screen for behavioral and mental health issues.

Jessica Vang, NP, works in a pediatric primary care clinic in Minneapolis. She says, “My experience growing up in the Hmong community significantly contributes to my understanding of diverse mental health perspectives.” She hopes to use her knowledge from our program to “normalize conversations about mental health” and help patients who otherwise might have to wait months to see a psychiatrist.

Gita Viswam, MD, is the sole pediatrician in a safety net clinic in the Dallas area. Herself the child of immigrants, Dr. Viswam understands the stresses facing her immigrant patients. But empathy is not enough. “I am compelled to educate myself on the most effective ways to support and treat them,” she wrote, in order to “contribute to improved mental health” for new Americans.

Gul-e-Shehwar Zahid, MD, is a pediatrician at safety net clinic in a rural community in central California where psychiatrists are rare. As a child and young adult in Karachi, Pakistan, Dr. Zahid saw how behavioral issues often resulted from trauma, family dysfunction, or learning disabilities. She wrote, “My background helps me understand the unique needs and mental health perspectives of the patients and families I serve.”