Assistant Professor of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, Neurology

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I am board-certified in Behavioral Sleep Medicine (American Board of Sleep Medicine and Board of Behavioral Sleep Medicine) and am the director of the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine Behavioral Sleep Medicine Program. I am interested in applying psychological/behavioral principles to bring about health behavior change in medically-complex patients. The focus of this work has been on treating sleep as a known, modifiable risk factor in the contexts of chronic pain and traumatic brain injury (TBI). Our group has developed considerable expertise in the multimodal assessment of sleep, including reliable methods to obtain extended daily actigraphy and electronic sleep diary data, electroencephalographic and psychophysiological data from patients with chronic sleep and pain disorders. All of these projects have utilized extensive ambulatory assessment methods to track positive and negative emotions, pain, and sleep. Further, my work has involved delivering short forms of cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia (CBT-i) to chronic pain patients and patients with mild to moderate TBI. In improving sleep, we are also interested in the mediating role of psychological factors and sleep in the relationship between chronic illness and health outcomes. Our long-term objective is to enhance existing, and develop innovative, treatments for sleep disorders for patients with chronic medical illness.