Dr. Andrea Allen is a New York State licensed psychologist who received her PhD in Psychology from Stanford University. Currently, her primary focus is on the treatment of obsessive compulsive and anxiety disorders, but she has had a long and comprehensive professional career, encompassing both teaching and research, which informs her clinical work.
Clinical Training and Practice
Dr. Allen received intensive training in cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT), psychodynamic therapy and assessment (diagnostic, personality and neuropsychological) at Fairleigh Dickinson University, the Bronx Center for Psychological Services of Bronx Lebanon Hospital, the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey's University Behavioral HealthCare Center in Newark, and the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City. Her work with the Compulsive, Impulsive & Anxiety Disorders Program involved evaluating patients diagnosed with OCD, BDD and other Obsessive Compulsive Spectrum disorders. She was the Director of Psychological Services when the Center of Excellence for Compulsive and Impulsive Disorders was founded. Although Dr. Allen has worked on studies of and has written extensively on psychopharmacological treatment of BDD, her main interest and focus has been on developing a CBT treatment for BDD. Due to the research protocols being conducted at Mount Sinai, Dr. Allen has had extensive experience working with severe, chronic OCD and BDD patients and has had success treating them.
Teaching
Dr. Allen has taught psychology at the University of Virginia, Stanford University, New York University and the Mount Sinai School of Medicine. She taught undergraduates, and both taught and supervised psychology graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, and psychiatry residents and fellows. She currently is on the clinical faculty of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine and supervises psychiatry residents at the Mount Sinai Medical Center.
Research
In addition to teaching, a strong focus of Dr. Allen's work has been on research. Earlier in her career she conducted research on normal personality functioning and behavior at Stanford, the University of Virginia and in the private sector. In the late 1990s, she joined the faculty of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine where her research focus changed to clinical psychology and psychiatry. As part of Eric Hollander MD's Compulsive, Impulsive & Anxiety Disorders Program, she did research on OCD, BDD, pathological gambling, impulsive personality disorders (including borderline personality disorder), and other anxiety disorders (such as panic disorder). Dr. Allen was this group's chief psychologist working on OCD and BDD, which were her main focus, and she has published extensively on both of these disorders.
Presentations
Dr. Allen has made professional presentations and media appearances on OC spectrum disorders internationally. These presentations and filmed/televised appearances include many in the United States as well as in Australia, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain's Canary Islands, St. John US Virgin Islands, and Poland.
Professional Affiliations
American Psychological Association
Anxiety Disorders Association of America
Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies
Association for Psychological Science
New York City Cognitive Behavioral Therapy Association
New York Psychological Association
Obsessive Compulsive Foundation, professional member
Society for Personality and Social Psychology (APA Division 8)
The TLC Foundation for Body Focused repetitive Behaviors, Professional Member