Director of the Stress and Health Research Program
Principal Investigator
M_Psychiatry
Dr. Neylan is a Professor, In Residence in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of California, San Francisco. He is the Director of the Posttraumatic Stress Disorders (PTSD) Clinic and the Stress and Health Research Program at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center. His research has focused on the role of sleep in emotion regulation, cognitive function, and metabolic health, in patients with PTSD, and more recently in aging populations with neurodegenerative disorders.
Dr. Gibson is a psychologist and health services researcher based at the San Francisco VA. Her research focuses on women’s physical and mental health related to menopause and aging. Her current work examines women Veterans’ mental health, the impact of interpersonal trauma on health during menopause and aging, and the effect of menopause and menopause symptoms on the development and exacerbation of mental health concerns.
My research goals include: 1) identifying psychobiological causes and consequences of traumatic stress symptoms; 2) utilizing fear conditioning and extinction models to better understand PTSD; 3) characterizing sex differences in the biology of PTSD; 4) improving measurement techniques in the laboratory and the field such as with mobile health devices; and 5) conducting research that will inform novel interventions for ameliorating prolonged PTSD responses.
Shira Maguen, Ph.D. is Mental Health Director of the Post-9/11 Integrated Care Clinic and Staff Psychologist on the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Clinical Team (PCT) at the San Francisco VA Health Care System (SFVAHCS), and Professor in the Dept. of Psychiatry, UCSF School of Medicine. Dr. Maguen was appointed to and is now serving on the Creating Options for Veterans' Expedited Recovery (COVER) Commission. She is also the San Francisco site lead for the VA Women’s Practice Based Research Network (PBRN) and Director of the SFVAHCS PTSD MIRECC Postdoctoral Research Fellowship.
People who experience traumatic or enduring psychological stress are more likely to develop psychiatric disorders as well as cardiovascular, autoimmune and neurodegenerative disorders. Our research is focused on revealing how psychological stress drives the development of mental and physical disorders. Specifically, we aim to identify the psychological and biological factors that account for the adverse effects of psychological stress, and ultimately to drive the development of targeted interventions to reduce such negative effects of stress.
Anne Richards, M.D., M.P.H., is a PTSD, sleep, and sex differences researcher in the Stress and Health Research Program at the San Francisco VA Medical Center. Dr. Richards also serves as an Associate Clinical Professor at the University of California, San Francisco and is a Staff Psychiatrist at the San Francisco VA Medical Center. Dr. Richards completed her undergraduate education at Harvard University and subsequently received her M.D. and M.P.H. from Columbia University.
Irina Strigo, Ph.D. is Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry at UCSF and UCSD and Research Physiologist at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. She received her research training from Columbia University (Radiology), Barrow Neurological Institute (Neurosurgery) and UC San Diego (Psychiatry). She received her Ph.D. and B.Sc. in Physiology from McGill University, Montreal, Canada.
