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Dr. Tess Judge-Ellis shares her journey from family nurse practitioner to psychiatric mental health specialist, highlighting the power of nurse-led psychotherapy in rural communities and beyond.

• Starting as a family NP in a town of 1,000 people before adding psychiatric specialization
• Creating accessible mental health services through a designated "counseling room" that reduced stigma
• Using interpersonal psychotherapy (IPT) and motivational interviewing to help patients with grief and substance use disorders
• Emphasizing that every nursing encounter has psychotherapeutic potential from the first moment
• Comparing psychotherapy to "physical therapy for the brain" - small exercises that create lasting change
• Advocating for nursing education that strengthens psychotherapy skills beyond medication management
• Addressing barriers including time constraints and reimbursement systems that limit therapeutic interaction

Join our next episode in a few weeks as we continue exploring psychotherapy in nursing practice, including upcoming interviews with nurses who trained directly under Hildegard Peplau!

Let’s Connect

Dr Dan Wesemann

Email: daniel-wesemann@uiowa.edu

Website: https://nursing.uiowa.edu/academics/dnp-programs/psych-mental-health-nurse-practitioner

LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/in/daniel-wesemann

Dr Kate Melino

Email: Katerina.Melino@ucsf.edu

Dr Sean Convoy

Email: sc585@duke.edu

Dr Kendra Delany

Email: Kendra@empowered-heart.com

Dr Melissa Chapman

Email: mchapman@pdastats.com