I am a dually registered Clinical Neuropsychologist and Forensic Psychologist.
I am a dually registered Clinical Neuropsychologist and Forensic Psychologist.
I have experience providing both neuropsychological and forensic risk evaluations, as well as a combination of the two. I am experienced in assessing neuropsychological status and risk in both adolescents and adults with possible brain injury and cognitive impairments. These evaluations include assessment of associated impacts on daily functioning, and identifying rehabilitative needs for treatment and/or management.
My experience has been in forensic and non-forensic populations, in hospitals, prisons, and community settings. I have also provided training to practitioners working with clients with cognitive impairments resulting from injury and/or complex mental illness, as well as increasing wider community awareness of brain injury, including risks, consequences, identification, and management planning.
I am focused on increasing the presence of neuropsychological evaluation, particularly for those who are vulnerable or already involved with the justice system. Neuropsychological evaluation provides a key part in rehabilitation for people with brain injuries, mental health issues and/or offending behaviours where cognitive difficulties may be present.
Understanding cognitive functioning beyond the IQ score has been shown to inform an understanding of the risk of recidivism (reoffending). Unrecognised impairments are often important barriers to treatment (a responsivity issue). In particular, for forensic clients, the addition of comprehensive or focused neuropsychological evaluation to traditional psychological risk assessment is often essential to accurately assessing reoffending risk and identifying individual specific responsivity issues, which in turn become targets for treatment. The identification of individual-specific neurocognitive issues assists treatment planning and access to appropriate services in both non-forensic and forensic clients alike, and can provide targets for treatment that can improve efficacy of rehabilitation and deliver positive outcomes and goals for both the client and community.
I completed a Doctor of Psychology (Clinical Neuropsychology, Forensic specialisation) at Monash University. I then worked concurrently as a research fellow and a clinical neuropsychologist in Victoria, Australia.
My research focused primarily on understanding neurocognitive characteristics of risky populations (e.g neural decisional and reward activation systems in methadone users and teenage drivers), and how these contribute to everyday functional difficulties.
Clinically, my focus has on the neuropsychological evaluation of complex clients with possible acquired brain injury (ABI), primarily as a result of injury (known as traumatic brain injury; or TBI) or prolonged substance abuse. Many of these referrals have been for individuals involved with the judicial system, where there were concerns regarding conditions impacting cognition, and the associated impact on behaviour and support requirements. Predominantly, these were pre-sentencing evaluations, although I have also completed fitness to stand trial assessments.
I have also worked internationally, providing forensic neuropsychological services, neuropsychological and risk assessments for forensic clients (determined not criminally responsible due to mental illness) at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH), the largest addiction and mental health facility in Canada.
In early 2016 I will be completing accredited supervision training to enable me to formally supervise junior colleagues in Australia, building on my experience supervising research and clinical students, as well as psychometrists overseas.
I am fully registered and endorsed as a Clinical Neuropsychologist and Forensic Psychologist with the Psychology Board of Australia, as well as internationally with the college of psychologists of Ontario. I am an active member with a number of relevant organisations including the Australian Psychological Society, College of Clinical Neuropsychologists, College of Forensic Psychologists, ASSBI, Canadian Psychological Association, Ontario Psychological Association, and the Australasian Cognitive Neuroscience Society.
