Who We Are

Shashank V. Joshi, MD, FAAP, DFAACAP
Professor and Program Director, CAP Fellowship

I am privileged to have served in different aspects of Stanford CAP Program leadership for over 20 years. Having grown up as a doctor across 3 institutions in Texas, New York and California, I have learned that the strength of any educational program lies in the camaraderie and connection among its trainees and their engagement with faculty. Our Division of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry strongly supports our training structure, which provides flexibility within the formal structure of a 2-year training program. CAP Fellows who actively participate in their educational, scholarly, and clinical opportunities here tend to have the greatest sense of fulfillment and well-being. As a program leadership team, we have learned that education is strongest when accounting for individual differences while pursuing common goals.

The highest priority of our CAP Fellowship Training Program is to prepare trainees for leadership roles in academic child & adolescent psychiatry, clinical practice and public service. As such, we provide many opportunities to develop leadership skills through participating in scholarly opportunities, seminars, faculty engagement, and national meetings. Regardless of their career choices, we believe that all Fellows must be thoroughly trained, first and foremost, as clinicians. Our mentor guided 6-week scholarly block in the CAP-1 year is unique among CAP programs nationally, and allows for deep exploration in specific topics of interest to Fellows. 

As a Professor, I am part of the diverse tapestry of academic activities among Stanford University faculty. It has been so fulfilling to introduce CAP Fellows to my interests in school mental health, suicide prevention, teaching and mentoring, professional development, and cultural psychiatry.

David S. Hong, MD
Associate Program Director for Research and Curriculum, CAP Fellowship

My personal learning philosophy is based on the importance of developing skills as a lifelong learner – a lesson that I continue to appreciate on a daily basis in my clinical and research activities. This same premise drives our CAP training structure, where we continually strive to deliver child and adolescent psychiatric education across clinical, didactic and research settings. Our intentional approach focuses on concentrating as much skill development in these domains within the fellowship period. Perhaps more importantly, we also highly value the importance of developing a lifelong learning mindset during fellowship, through the acknowledgement that there will be much to learn about child and adolescent psychiatry for many years after fellowship concludes. To these ends, fellows are active stakeholders in the training program, and quickly develop into dual roles both as trainees learning a new field, and also as leaders within the multiple communities that comprise our clinical, educational and national efforts.

As the Associate Program Director for Research and Curriculum, I am particularly interested in innovative approaches to teaching neuroscientific principles and brain-based understanding of complex human behavior, while incorporating the many complex interpersonal and environmental influences that impact a child’s development. I am also invested in mentoring fellows interested in academic child psychiatry and research, who are sorely needed to advance our field. My own research uses multiple levels of inquiry ranging from neuroimaging, cognitive-behavioral and genomics methods, to technological approaches to electronic health records and mobile mental health apps. Across this broad spectrum, the common thread of my research is a focus on developmental and cognitive neuroscience, which also holds true in my clinics which focus on neurodevelopmental conditions and genetic syndromes. Ultimately, I am passionate about innovation in the conceptualization of child psychiatric conditions, and the critical need for incorporating development as a fundamental concept in how disorders are defined and treated. I am always eager to include fellows in any, or all these initiatives, and to collaborate on how to incorporate these themes in fellowship education.

Isheeta Zalpuri, MD
Associate Program Director, CAP Fellowship

Growing up, I always dreamed of being an educator one day and this desire was only strengthened during training when I learned about a program director’s impact on their trainees. As the Associate Program Director of the CAP Fellowship program, my scholarly work focuses on physician well-being, professionalism and faculty development. I believe that professionalism, along with mentorship, sponsorship and professional development opportunities, is a key driver of one’s well-being. This is in line with the values of our program, which emphasizes compassion, collegiality and respect for one’s personal and professional needs, and where Faculty understand the importance of providing supervision while promoting autonomy as Fellows progress during their training.

I direct the Fellowship’s Ethics and Professionalism Course, and am the Co-Chair for the Well-Being and Professional Development Committee. I am particularly interested in developing a better understanding of the association of trainee and faculty well-being with professional development, and crafting creative ideas to enhance professional fulfillment within the Department. As the Acting Director of the Pediatric Mood Disorders Clinic, I provide direct supervision to Fellows to help them develop expertise within the context of providing excellent, patient-centered clinical care for the youth seen in our clinic, many of whom have an elevated risk for suicide.

From our engaging didactic seminars and enriching, immersive clinical experiences, our program takes pride in supporting Fellows to develop a sense of professional identity as a psychotherapist, psychopharmacologist, family psychiatrist, advocate and consultant-- with the aim to produce inquisitive lifelong learners who become experts and leaders in the field of child & adolescent psychiatry.

Janani Venugopalakrishnan, MD, MPH,
Assistant Program Director, CAP Fellowship

I am constantly amazed at the unwavering commitment of the Stanford community towards a culture of excellence which continues to inspire me to this day. I am currently a clinical associate professor with additional leadership roles as Co-Director of Neuropsychopharmacology clinic, Director of INSPIRE Early Psychosis Program, while also being one of the primary supervising faculty members in the Autism clinic. In my role as assistant program director, I am closely involved with overseeing the second year training opportunities and sites.

Strengths of ​our child and adolescent training program include an exemplary academic setting with multiple highly specialized clinical training sites, comprehensive didactics and opportunities for translational cutting-edge research. We take pride in supporting not only the academic and professional needs of our trainees but also their personal well-being and growth. It is a robust, vibrant and a well-rounded program known to be family friendly while nurturin​g a sense of wellness, and community. The program has a track record of producing clinical leaders and physician scientists.

My passion is working with children with developmental disorders and neurodiversity and providing quality multidisciplinary care. As the co-director of the pediatric Neuropsychopharmacology clinic, an interdepartmental collaborative effort between the Stanford pediatric neurology and child psychiatry, I focus on caring for children and young adults with complex neuropsychiatric issues. In my other role as Director of the INPIRE early psychosis program, I work very closely with prodromal patients who are clinically high risk for first onset psychosis. I enjoy teaching and am actively involved in graduate education, teaching and mentoring medical students, residents, and fellows in various clinical and formal lecture settings while also guiding them in career opportunities. Being an academician, teacher, and clinician is a lifelong goal and I've greatly enjoyed working with the fellows with an opportunity for great bidirectional learning.

Paula Tran, MD
Assistant Program Director, CAP Fellowship

As a California native, I completed my undergraduate studies and medical school in southern California before moving north for residency at UCSF and fellowship at Stanford. I am honored and thrilled to be part of the Stanford Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (CAP) Fellowship training leadership team as an Assistant Program Director. In this role, I support fellows in their educational and professional goals, and enhance learning opportunities within the fellowship program.

The Stanford CAP Fellowship program encourages its trainees to think critically and collaboratively about unanswered questions and systemic challenges in pediatric psychiatry—in the laboratory, clinical, and classroom settings, and importantly, in broader society. Fellows select an area of scholarly concentration in their first year and actively participate in quality improvement projects during both years of training. These experiences, along with early mentorship, and exposure to leaders in pediatric psychiatry as well as the overlapping systems of care, help fellows identify, carve, and differentiate their career paths. The breadth and depth of training experiences within the Stanford Child Psychiatry community are unparalleled, further amplified by the many possibilities for interdisciplinary collaboration across specialties and disciplines.

As a clinician educator, I teach and supervise in a pediatric tertiary care hospital, where there is ample opportunity, need, and appreciation for teamwork. My clinical expertise encircles the medical-psychiatric interface and includes how medical conditions can present psychiatrically in the pediatric population, the unique mental and behavioral health concerns of medically ill children and their families, and how neuropsychiatric diseases are identified and treated.

Ola Golovinsky, MS
Manager, Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Training Programs
ola.golovinsky@stanford.edu

Maryam Mossadeghian
Coordinator, Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Training Programs
maryammossadeghian@stanford.edu

Charles Larson
Coordinator, Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Training Programs
celarson@stanford.edu