Keeping It Together While Apart: Mental Health Professionals Help to Navigate Life During the Covid Pandemic (Watch on YouTube)

Sunday, August 9 at 10 a.m. via Zoom and Facebook Live

Click Here for Resources mentioned during the Panel.

Margie Scherzer, LCSW, licensed clinical social worker currently employed as a school counselor in a local middle school. She has been working as a school social worker and school counselor for 23 years.  She is best versed in working with children and adolescents around their social and emotional development and anxiety in teens. She and her family have been at KI for over 15 years.

Inna Conboy, M.D. is a Board Certified Psychiatrist who specializes in psychoanalytic psychotherapy (also known as psychodynamic psychotherapy, and insight oriented psychotherapy) and medication management since 2010. She graduated from New Jersey Medical School, NJ and completed psychiatry residency at Temple University, PA. In addition, she was trained in psychodynamic psychotherapy at the Psychoanalytic Center of Philadelphia. Dr. Conboy was a recipient of various teaching awards and certificates, and has been teaching psychiatry to La Salle University and Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine medical, nurse practitioner, and physician assistant students. She has given lectures to psychiatry and psychology professionals in various topics, including psychotherapy, psychopharmacology, and the use of mindfulness meditation in psychiatry. Dr. Conboy’s treatment philosophy centers around an empathic view of the person as a whole, and explores the patient’s past and present in order to understand his/her current thoughts and feelings. As a person attains a deeper understanding of self, this awareness may help with his/her life struggles. While psychotherapy is Dr. Conboy’s primary form of treatment, she also prescribes medications, and offers counseling in other evidence based treatments such as cardiovascular exercise, meditation, and yoga. While she sees patients with various mental health issues, Dr. Conboy is particularly dedicated to working with women and their partners who are dealing with perinatal and reproductive psychiatric issues, postpartum depression and anxiety, and other women’s mental health issues.

Joel Schwartz M.D. almost flunked out of nursery school because he was unable to sit on his carpet square on the floor. Despite this squirminess, which continued during his tenure at Franklin and Marshall College and medical school, he was Phi Beta Kappa. He went on to receive his medical degree from Hahnemann University Hospital, and his psychiatric training at the Institute of Living, and Hahnemann University. He is the recipient of the Herman Belmont Award for Excellence in Teaching Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, has been on of the “Top Docs”list of Philadelphia Magazine several times and has received the United States Air Force Commendation Medal during his tour of duty in the U.S. Air Force. He is a Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association. Dr. Schwartz has been the Chairman of the Department of Psychiatry at Abington Memorial Hospital, a community hospital just north of Philadelphia for the past 13 years. He is a board certified Child, Adolescent, and Adult Psychiatrist as well as a certified Child, Adolescent, and Adult Psychoanalyst. Prior to this, Dr. Schwartz has been an Associate Director and Head of Child and Adolescent Services at Northwestern Institute, a Residency training director for a Child and Adolescent Fellowship, a teacher and a supervisor for psychiatric residents and psychoanalytic candidates.He has also been a flea circus trainer, a weatherman in Fargo, North Dakota, and in private practice.He is the author of eight books for young adolescents age 10 to 14. His first book “Upchuck Summer” sold over 150,000 copies in paperback. He recently published “Noses are Red,” a manual for parents on how to improve their child’s sense of humor. He needs to sell 149,971 more copies to beat the Upchuck record. And he still can’t sit still. http://www.stresslessshrink.com

Robin Capecci studied undergrad at West Chester University and then went straight to University of Pittsburgh for her Masters. She is an extremely hard worker and has dedicated over 30 years of her life at the hospital. A social worker gets to meet all different kinds of people and help them but they also see bad things happen to good people. She is always thinking about others first and her daughter says, “I want her to get to enjoy life because she is always worrying about everyone else”. Robin and her husband, Joe, have been married for 28 years. Joe Capecci, suffers from Multiple Systems Atrophy and she is his primary caretaker.

Tamar Klaiman, PhD, MPH, is Senior Qualitative Research Scientist at University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine. She supports the Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics (CHIBE) Department of  Medical Ethics and Health Policy and the Palliative and Advanced Illness Research Center (PAIR). Tamar has over 10 years of experience conducting public health and health services research in a variety of topic areas. She has published numerous papers related to the response to 2009 H1N1 and other emergency preparedness issues. She also serves as an adjunct instructor in the Health Policy program at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia and teaches in the Master’s in Public Health program at the University of Pennsylvania.