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Women in Medicine: Victoria E. Cosgrove, PhD
During September, we proudly feature members of our department for Women in Medicine Month!
Why did you pursue a career in medicine?
When I was growing up, I didn't know that there were areas of medicine that focused exclusively on mental health. After I learned about clinical psychology and psychiatry during my first year of college, I never considered another career path. Academic medicine allows me to interweave my commitments to research, clinical care, and teaching in a way that no other career would allow.
What is your work focused on?
My work advances clinical medicine by concentrating on ways that individual biological and psychological responses to social stress impact health and well-being. I serve as Director of the Stress Responsivity, Emotion, and Mood (StREaM) Laboratory which transdiagnostically studies ways that psychobiological stress responsivity is implicated in emerging and protracted affective symptomatology. Our team also develops and trials interventions that promote robust and adaptive responses to stress. Our myriad projects are supported extramurally and intramurally by the National Cancer Institute, the National Institute of Mental Health, the Klingenstein Third Generation Foundation, and the Stanford Maternal and Child Health Research Institute, among others. Current and past projects engage diverse patient populations (e.g., pediatric oncology, pediatric mood disorders, bipolar disorders in adults), thus StREaM maintains active partnerships with the Divisions of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and Pediatric Neurology and the Bipolar and Depression Research Program).
What is the most fulfilling part of your work?
I am fulfilled by my work because it allows me to ask important research questions in clinical populations about whom I care very deeply, with the goal and hope that our team's findings may directly inform and promote novel clinical interventions. I am also able to work with brilliant students and colleagues and learn something new almost every day.
What advice would you give yourself when you started in the field, knowing what you know now?
I have tremendous compassion for my younger, overwhelmed self. What would I say? Your insatiable work ethic is commendable, but learn how to delegate earlier rather than later. Be patient--you WILL master the art of public speaking. Seek out myriad mentors to support you in the different roles you hold, and make sure MANY of these are women. Follow your passion--clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose.
Victoria E. Cosgrove, PhD
Women in Medicine
We asked some of the #StanfordWIM in our department to share their stories - why they pursued a career in medicine, what their work focuses on, what the most fulfilling parts of their work are, and what advice they would give themselves when they started in the field. Hear what they have to say!
- Rania Awaad, MD
- Michele Berk, PhD
- Kim Bullock, MD
- Victoria E. Cosgrove, PhD
- Smita Das, MD, PhD, MPH
- Nandini Datta, PhD
- Grace Gengoux, PhD, BCBA-D
- Michelle Goldsmith, MD, MA
- Heather J. Gotham, PhD
- Rona J. Hu, MD
- Jessika Hurts, PsyD
- Christina Khan, MD, PhD
- Debra Kaysen, PhD
- Sheila Lahijani, MD
- Karen J. Parker, PhD
- Jennifer Phillips, PhD
- Natalie Rasgon, MD, PhD
- Lauren Schneider, PsyD
- Shebani Sethi MD, ABOM
- Hui Qi Tong, PhD
- Kathleen Watson, PhD
- Sharon Williams, PhD
- Laraine T. Zappert, PhD