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Dr. Amatruda is a Mental Health Supervisor on DMAT CA-6, a Federal Disaster Medical Assistance Team. She has deployed to Haiti, the Southeast Asia and American Samoa tsunamis, Hurricanes Katrina, Gustav and Ike, Florida Tornadoes, the San Diego wildfires, and many local disasters. With DMAT, her role is Force Protection – how to assist responders in self-care and prevention of secondary trauma in disasters where large numbers of people are impacted. She trains the team to recognize stress reactions, stress protection, how to engage with disoriented disaster survivors, how to assess for psychological illness in survivors, etc. Through Managed Health Network, she conducts Critical Incident Stress Debriefings with First Responders, Sheriff, Police, bank employees, in hospitals – in short – she goes when they call. She has worked with members of the Armed Forces and their families on bases in the US and in Europe as an MFLC - Military Family and Life Consultant. She serves on CALMAT, the Marin Medical Reserve Corps, and with the American Red Cross, she is a Disaster Service Mental Health responder and the former Mental Health Lead for the Marin County Chapter. She rode with The Burning Man Crisis Intervention Team and is a member of the California Association of Marriage and Family Therapists Trauma Response Network. Dr. Amatruda has lectured internationally and taught at Southwestern College in Santa Fe, the California Institute of Integral Studies, the Professional School of Psychology, and in the Extended Education departments at U.C. Berkeley and Sonoma State University, and has supervised numerous clinicians. Dr. Amatruda had a private practice in the San Francisco Bay Area for 30+ years, where she worked with children, adolescents, adults, couples and families doing both brief and long-term therapy, conducted Critical Incident Stress Debriefings as well as worked with members of the Armed Forces and their families on bases in the US and in Europe. She did her sandplay training with Dora Kalff in Zollikon, Switzerland. Dr. Amatruda is the author of Sandplay, The Sacred Healing, A Field Guide to Disaster Mental Health: The Very Big Wave and the Mean Old Storm, Trauma, Terror and Treatment: PTSD in children and adults, Tsunami Journal, many journal articles and chapters, as well as many online courses at www.psychceu.com. She received her BA from UC Berkeley, her MA from John F. Kennedy University, and her PsyD from Ryokan College. Please contact Dr. Amatruda at dr.katieamatruda@gmail.com
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