Paula Domenici

Paula Domenici, PhD is currently a Deployment Behavioral Health Psychologist of the Center for Deployment Psychology placed at the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. Here she is providing treatment to service members with combat stress reactions, including those on the Casualty Care Unit, as well as offering support and psychoeducation to family members and training military psychology interns. From September 2005 through August 2006, she was a Congressional Fellow in Washington, DC, selected by the American Psychological Association under the osmosis of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. During this policy fellowship, she worked in the Office of Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton on the health team covering mental health, aging, and select veterans’ issues and learning how psychologists can contribute to policy formation and the legislative process. Dr. Domenici was formerly a Staff Psychologist on the Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Clinical Team at the San Francisco VA Medical Center. There she helped develop the clinical program for recently returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan and coordinated the mental health triaging for this group of veterans. She has provided individual and group therapy to these veterans as well as those from the Persian Gulf and Vietnam wars and World War II. She also spearheaded the support program for partners and spouses of veterans while training and supervising graduate psychology students. While in San Francisco, she additionally maintained a small private practice for adults. Dr. Domenici has presented at various conferences on the reactions to war and readjustment concerns of returning troops and recently co-authored the book, Courage After Fire: Coping Strategies for Troops Returning from Iraq and Afghanistan and Their Families. She received her doctoral degree in Counseling Psychology from the University of Maryland, College Park in 2002 and completed her internship at the Baltimore VA Medical Center and postdoctoral training at the San Francisco VA Medical Center. Prior to this, she received her master’s degree in Developmental Psychology from Teachers College, Columbia University.