Interventional Psychiatry Fellowship Program

Dr. Bhati is an interventional psychiatrist with expertise in psychiatric diagnosis, psychopharmacology, and neuromodulation. He completed postdoctoral research studying language abnormalities and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) evoked potentials in schizophrenia. He was a principal investigator for the DSM-5 academic field trials, and his research experiences included roles as an investigator in the first controlled clinical trials of deep brain stimulation (DBS) and low-field synchronized TMS for treatment of depression. He was the founding Chief of Interventional Psychiatry at Stanford where he performs consultations and provides pharmacological and neuromodulatory treatments. His current research interests include studying magnetic resonance imaging and augmented reality to target TMS, vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) for treatment-resistant depression, DBS for obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) and depression, responsive neurostimulation (RNS) for treatment of impulse and fear-related disorders, and focused ultrasound (FUS) for treatment-resistant OCD and depression. Dr. Bhati seeks to train more providers in mental healthcare and founded a clinical fellowship in Interventional Psychiatry at Stanford.

Dr. Buch is a neurosurgeon with fellowship training in epilepsy, functional, and minimally invasive neurosurgery. He is an Assistant Professor of Neurosurgery, and Christina and Hamid Moghadam Faculty Scholar at Stanford University. Dr. Buch focuses his expertise on the open and minimally invasive treatment of epilepsy, low grade brain tumors, movement and neuropsychiatric disorders, facial and body pain syndromes, and other complex neurological conditions. He uses advanced and innovative techniques to treat both adult and pediatric patients. For each patient, he develops a personalized care plan that is designed to be both comprehensive and compassionate. Dr. Buch has conducted extensive research. His career goal is to develop restorative bioengineering approaches for complex neurocognitive, neurodevelopmental, and neuropsychiatric disorders. He is creating network-neuroprosthetics and focused ultrasound delivery mechanisms for precision cellular, gene, and molecular therapies to restore abnormal brain circuit function in these vulnerable patient populations. He is further pioneering novel intraoperative technologies including personalized network-based targeting, holographic mixed reality, and artificial intelligence platforms for minimally invasive cranial surgery. He has co-authored articles on his research discoveries in Nature Medicine, Neuron, Brain, Annals of Surgery, Frontiers in Neuroscience, Epilepsia, Brain Stimulation, Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery, Surgical Innovation, Frontiers in Surgery, Journal of Neurosurgery, and many other journals. Articles focus on developing novel network control theory applications to human brain functions and new techniques and technologies to enhance neurosurgical effectiveness and patient outcomes. He is the Section Editor for NEUROSURGERY, and a guest editor for Surgical Innovation and Brain Sciences. He also has co-authored chapters in the books Neurosurgical Atlas, Operative Techniques in Epilepsy Surgery, Deep Brain Stimulation, and The Encyclopedia of Medical Robotics. Dr. Buch has presented the findings of his research at the national conferences of numerous professional associations. Among them are the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, Society for Neuroscience, Congress of Neurological Surgeons, and Society for Imaging Informatics in Medicine. Topics include understanding network mechanisms of cognitive control and advances in the use of augmented reality technology to enhance neurosurgical approaches. For his clinical, research, and academic achievements. Dr. Buch has earned many honors. He has won awards from the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, American Roentgen Ray Society, Congress of Neurological Surgeons, and National Institutes of Health. Dr. Buch is a member of the American Association of Neurological Surgeons, Congress of Neurological Surgeons, World Society for Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery, American Association of Stereotactic and Functional Neurosurgery, and Alpha Omega Alpha Medical Honor Society. He holds patents on such topics as artificial intelligence systems designed to help guide surgery and neural control signals for behavioral modification and closed-loop stimulation therapy.

Dr. Choi is an interventional and forensic neuropsychiatrist on the Stanford faculty. He received his MD/PhD at UC-San Diego as part of NIH's Medical Scientist Training Program. He received his PhD degree in Neuroscience for work done at the Salk Institute on neural development. Dr Choi is the founder of Stanford's Forensic Psychiatry Fellowship Program. As a forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Choi specializes in neurolaw, an emerging interdisciplinary field that studies the use and misuse of neuroscience-based evidence in the courtroom. His research interests include the use of functional brain imaging to discern mental states (e.g. lie detection, pain assessment), and the neural basis for moral decision making (e.g. defects in moral reasoning brain centers giving rise to psychopathy). A central question he considers is: how do advances in our knowledge of the neural basis of behavior change perceptions of how offenders should be punished? And when are advanced research-level neuroimaging technologies “ready” for use in the courtroom? He has testified as a court-appointed expert, as well as for the prosecution and defense, in many high-profile and complex cases involving psychiatric, neurologic, medical, and medication-related legal claims. Dr. Choi is an active educator, providing seminars to students, attorneys, judges, neuroscientists and clinicians on the importance and relevance of neuroscience and the law. He is co-instructor of the popular Stanford undergraduate course “The Brain and the Law," and host of the KZSU radio program "Ask Dr. Choi," focusing on issues around student wellness, such as toxic perfectionism. Dr. Choi’s clinical interests include neuromodulatory approaches to treat psychiatric illness, such as the use of transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) to treat major depression. He is part of the interventional psychiatry group of Stanford Medicine, conducting clinical work and research to advance the power, precision, and scope of neuromodulation.

Dr. Huiqiong Deng is a clinical associate professor of psychiatry. In addition to a medical degree, she earned a PhD, with a major in rehabilitation science and a minor in neuroscience. Specializing in the treatment of alcohol/substance addiction, interventional and cultural psychiatry, her goal is to help each patient along the journey to achieve optimal health and quality of life. As the co-author of more than a dozen scholarly articles, Dr. Deng’s work has appeared in Psychiatry Research, Journal of Studies on Alcohol and Drugs, American Journal on Addictions, Brain Stimulation, and other publications. Dr. Deng has won numerous honors and awards such as the National Institute on Drug Abuse Young Investigator Travel Award, the Ruth Fox Scholarship from the American Society of Addiction Medicine, and College on the Problems of Drug Dependence Travel Award for Early Career Investigators. In addition, she was selected to attend the Annual American Psychiatry Association Research Colloquium for Junior Investigators. Since she joined faculty at Stanford, Dr. Deng has received research grant support by the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences Innovator Grant Program.

Dr. Keller is an Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University and an Assistant Professor at the Veterans Affairs PaloAlto Health Care System (VAPAHCS). He is a member of Stanford Bio-X and the Wu Tsai Neurosciences Institute. Dr. Keller received his MD and PhD in neuroscience from the Medical Scientist Training Program at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He completed his residency in psychiatry at Stanford University Medical Center focused on interventional psychiatry. Dr Keller has received several grants including the F31, T32, K23, DP5 Early Independence Award, SBIR, and R01 awards. He co-developed a fully automated non-invasive brain mapping technique used across industry and academia, and has run two clinical trials (NCT01829165 and NCT02843373) collecting over 1500 participants across ten clinical centers. Dr. Keller has extensive experience in the assessment and management of individuals with treatment-resistant depression. He has developed methodology for capturing the neurophysiology of human brain networks and the effect of stimulation through invasive and non-invasive electrophysiology.     The overarching goal of Dr. Keller’s Laboratory, the Stanford Precision Neurotherapeutics Lab (precisionneuro.stanford.edu) is to improve brain stimulation treatment for neurological and psychiatric disease. His lab focuses on understanding the neural mechanisms of how brain stimulation technologies induce alter brain circuits in an effort to develop novel, personalized, and more effective brain stimulation treatments. His lab combines invasive and noninvasive human electrophysiology to answer these critical questions.

Dr. Daniel Kim is a board-certified geriatric psychiatrist who serves as medical director of the inpatient geriatric psychiatry service and program director of the geriatric psychiatry fellowship. His primary area of interest is in the education of medical students, residents, and fellows in geriatric psychiatry.

Dr. Kratter is an adult psychiatrist and fellowship-trained neuropsychiatrist and Clinical Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. He is also director of Invasive Technologies in the Stanford Brain Stimulation Laboratory. His clinical interests include the psychiatric and cognitive aspects of movement disorders like Parkinson's and Tourette's as well as depression, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and non-invasive and invasive neuromodulation for neuropsychiatric illness. His research interests focus on assessing outcomes and understanding the mechanisms of both neuromodulatory and novel pharmacological treatments. This includes both clinical and more mechanistic studies, such as using techniques like repetitive transcranial magnetic stimulation (rTMS) and deep brain stimulation in combination with neuroimaging and electrophysiology. He has been a co-investigator for such studies focusing on obsessive-compulsive disorder, major depressive disorder, and suicidal ideation, and traumatic brain injury. His work has appeared in a number of scientific journals including Nature Medicine, American Journal of Psychiatry, Journal of Clinical Investigation, Translational Psychiatry, and Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. He also co-authored the chapter on major depression in the textbook Deep Brain Stimulation: Techniques and Practice.

Dr. Raj specializes in the treatment of mood disorders with an expertise in neuromodulation and in the psychopharmacological management of bipolar disorder. She is chief of interventional psychiatry, including transcranial magnetic stimulation and electroconvulsive therapy, co-chief of mood disorders and chief of the bipolar clinic. She is the director of education for interventional psychiatry where she manages resident education in ECT and TMS and development of didactics. She is also co-director of the neuroscience curriculum for the psychiatry residency where she has worked to assess and create a new series of interactive lectures. She currently serves on the Board of Directors and the Education Committee of the Clinical TMS society. She is on the Board of Directors for the Foundation for the Advancement of Clinical TMS.

Khalid Salaheldin, MD, holds the position of Clinical Assistant Professor and serves as an interventional psychiatrist within the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University School of Medicine. His expertise lies in the specialized care of individuals who present with early psychosis. At Stanford, Dr. Salaheldin's current responsibilities encompass a range of clinical activities, including evaluating patients with early psychosis at the INSPIRE clinic, providing care in the inpatient psychiatric unit, and delivering interventional psychiatry services. In addition to his clinical work, he is actively engaged in teaching, conducting research, and fostering collaborative learning among his patients and colleagues. His treatment philosophy is a recovery oriented and compassionate approach evaluating vital underlying factors alongside pharmacotherapy & neuromodulatory interventions including: sleep, exercise, nutrition, mindfulness, therapy integration, underlying medical issues, substance use, psychosocial history, and importantly patients’ current relationships (including pets of course!). His approach focuses on meeting patients where they are at in their health journey, aligning treatment with their personal goals, and being actively present in their management. Dr. Salaheldin’s research interests include early psychosis interventions, underlying medical causes of psychiatric symptoms, neuromodulation, community/global mental health, spirituality and mental health, healthcare worker mental health, novel psychiatric therapeutics, and mental health parity & policy. Before joining Stanford, Dr. Salaheldin served as the academic chief resident at Northwell Health, where his focus centered on designing a consult liaison service for patients experiencing a first episode of psychosis. This pioneering initiative aimed to provide compassionate support to patients and their families from the moment they arrived at the emergency room, throughout their inpatient stay, and during their transition to the outpatient setting. He hopes to continue this work on a local and global scale. “True compassion means not only feeling another's pain, but also being moved to help relieve it. ” —Daniel Goleman

Parnika Saxena is board certified in general and geriatric psychiatry. She completed her residency at St Elizabeth's Medical Center (affiliated with Tufts University School of Medicine) in Massachusetts and a clinical geriatric fellowship at the University of California, Los Angeles. She also worked as a research fellow in Clinical Psychopharmacology at Mclean Hospital (affiliated with Harvard Medical School) and also completed a psychoanalytic psychotherapy fellowship from the Boston Psychoanalytic Society and Institute. Her primary research interests lie in pharmacological and interventional treatments for resistant depression. At Stanford, she works on the inpatient service, outpatient geropsychiatry clinic and the electroconvulsive therapy service. She also serves at the program director of the Geriatric Psychiatry Fellowship. In addition to her clinical and research interests, she is passionate about patient advocacy and promoting mental health legislative changes to benefit patient care and has testified in state senate hearings to that end as a physician representative of organizations like the Northern California Psychiatric Association and American Psychiatric Association.

Dr. Barbara Sommer specializes in geriatric psychiatry, treating older patients suffering from depression, anxiety, psychosis, and cognitive disorders, often in the context of concomitant medical illnesses. She has practiced in both inpatient and outpatient settings for over thirty years and she has a special interest in the unique primary and side effects of psychiatric medications in older patients also being treated for non-psychiatric disorders. She also is a member of the electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) service.

Nolan Williams, M.D. is an Associate Professor of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University and Director of the Stanford Brain Stimulation Lab. The long-term goals of his research program are to develop innovative technologies and therapeutics capable of modulating the neural circuitry disrupted in mood disorders, OCD, and other neuropsychiatric conditions. His team has been developing neuroimaging-based approaches to precisely target therapeutic delivery and predict treatment responses to therapeutic neuromodulation and psychedelics. Dr. Williams earned his M.D. and completed his dual residencies in neurology and psychiatry at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). Triple board-certified in general neurology, general psychiatry, as well as behavioral neurology and neuropsychiatry, Dr. Williams brings a comprehensive background in clinical neuroscience to his role as a clinically active neuropsychiatrist. His expertise extends to the development and implementation of novel therapeutics, including devices and novel compounds, for central nervous system illnesses. Over the past decade, Dr. Williams’ laboratory alongside collaborators at Stanford University have pioneered multiple novel therapeutic and human neuroscience approaches. Notably, Stanford Accelerated Intelligent Neuromodulation Therapy (SAINT) is the world's first non-invasive, rapid-acting neuromodulation approach for treatment-resistant depression. SAINT received FDA Breakthrough Device Designation Status (2021) and FDA Clearance (2022) and is the first psychiatric treatment to be covered by Medicare New Technology Add-On Payment (NTAP). As of April 2024, SAINT has been reimbursed for patients suffering from severe depression within inpatient psychiatric units. The SAINT technology is being deployed both clinically and in research protocols in laboratories and hospitals worldwide. Dr. Williams also has an expertise in psychedelic medicines for neuropsychiatric illness and is the first investigator to conduct mechanistic clinical trials exploring the neurobiological effects of ibogaine. His research accomplishments have garnered international recognition, earning prestigious awards from the Pritzker Neuropsychiatric Disorders Consortium, One Mind Institute, Wellcome Leap Foundation, International Brain Stimulation Conference, National Institute of Mental Health (Biobehavioral Research Award for Innovative New Scientists), Society of Biological Psychiatry (A. E. Bennett Award), along with multiple awards from the Brain Behavior Research Foundation (most notably the Gerald L. Klerman Award). His work has been featured in Scientific American, The New York Times, The Washington Post, USA Today, CBS Sunday Morning, and the TODAY Show.