Presenters' Profiles

Josephine Beatson

...is a senior clinical advisor to Spectrum, a consultant psychiatrist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist with over 20 years experience in public and private settings. She is a Senior Fellow in the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences at the University of Melbourne. She has a particular interest in the understanding and treatment of severe personality disorders and promotion of reflective practice with these clients.

Julian Browne

... is a psychologist with a background in psychotherapy with individuals, groups and couples, and has worked in both forensic and community settings around complex clients with a history of trauma. He has an interest in innovative training methods, and systems theory as applied to families and organisations.

Harry Constantinou

...is a psychologist and psychoanalytic psychotherapist who works within Spectrum's Community Services Team as a senior clinician providing consultation and individual treatment. He has over 10 years clinical experience working in various community settings and is also in private practice.

Kate Cooke

...is a psychiatric and general nurse, psychodramatist and anthropologist. She has had 37 years work in a variety of public and private, psychiatric and non-psychiatric settings in Australia and New Zealand. She has worked with individuals and groups as a nurse, therapist, trainer and mediator. Kate works at Spectrum as a senior clinician leading the kinaesthetic groups within the Treatment Services Program.

Debbie Dick

...is a family therapist and psychiatric nurse with 21 years experience in a range of mental health settings including crisis teams. She works in the Spectrum Community Services team and also in private practice.

Jan Giffin

...is an occupational therapist, family therapist and psychotherapist who is the team leader of Spectrum's Community Services team. She has worked as a case manager and therapist in community and inpatient mental health settings.

Ben McGill

...is a social worker. He is also practicising clinical psychoanalysis. Ben has many years experience with psychiatric disability and rehabilitation services (PDRS), carer services, youth work and CAMHS.

Kelly McMahon

... is a clinical psychologist with 20 years experience in adult mental health and psychotherapy. She is currently the team leader of the Spectrum community treatment team. She was instrumental in designing Spectrum's group therapy program in 1999, and prior to this worked in CATT, inpatient units, and case management. Kelly has an interest in group and individual psychotherapy with clients with complex and high risk presentations.

Hita Mistry

...is a clinical and forensic psychologist. She works in the community treatment team at Spectrum providing ACT and MBT based group interventions and individual psychotherapy. Hita has over 10 years of clinical and research experience predominantly in the forensic sector, both in the UK and Australia and in private practice. She has a particular interest in the contributions and clinical utility of psychodynamic theory in the treatment of personality disorder.

Sathya Rao

...is the Director of Spectrum and a consultant psychiatrist. He is a DBT therapist and has a keen interest in teaching and training. He held the position of Chair of the Victorian Psychiatry Training Committee for over six years. He is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer are the School of Psychology and Psychiatry at Monash University.

Janina Tomasoni

...is a psychologist and psychotherapist who has worked with complex and challenging individuals across a number of public mental health and disability settings as well as private settings over the last 16 years. Currently she works in Spectrum's Community Services Program providing intensive psychological support to clients and services. Janina has a particular interest in the adaptation of psychological therapies to people with cognitive deficits.

Robert Trett

... began a nursing career in New Zealand in 1981 and has worked as a mental health nurse since 1986. He completed training as a psychotherapist with admission to the NZ Association of Psychotherapists in 1995 and was awarded a Masters Degree in psychotherapy in 2001. Since 2001 Robert has worked for Spectrum, the Personality Disorder Service for Victoria in a variety of clinical and leadership roles. He is currently Spectrum’s Associate Director. Robert has completed advanced training in Mentalisation Based Treatment (MBT) and primarily uses this model in treating people with borderline personality disorder.

Peta Welsh

…is a clinical psychologist who is training in psychoanalysis. Her work at Spectrum as part of the Community Services Team is predominantly the provision of individual treatment to those who are deemed difficult to engage and to treat and more recently this has focussed on adolescents and young adults.  Her previous work experience includes dual diagnosis and psychiatric disability support. Her interest is in how to sustain clinical interest and vibrancy in the face of chronicity and complexity.

Katie Wyman

...is a psychologist who has worked as a clinician and researcher in public mental health for the last 10 years. Her individual and group work is largely influenced by Acceptance and Commitment Therapy and Humanistic frameworks. Katie is currently researching the contribution of therapists' personal charateristics to the therapeutic alliance.