As a clinician educator and clinical scientist, Yale Child Study Center (YCSC) Assistant Professor Rebecca Kamody, PhD focuses on youth with eating disorders and high-risk life-threatening behaviors including suicidality. She first joined the YCSC community in 2017 when matching for her predoctoral and postdoctoral fellowships, later transitioning to a faculty member in July 2020. She earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Memphis in 2018, with a research focus on pediatric health disparities, particularly in eating and weight disorder presentations.
Kamody is currently taking the lead on developing and directing an innovative and collaborative eating disorder program in a partnership between the YCSC and Yale New Haven Children’s Hospital (YNHH). This will include providing direct clinical service to patients, as well as leading the systematic build of the clinical research program, along with training and supervision of clinical staff and trainees.
In addition to her direct clinical work, Kamody pinpoints the theme of her research career as “identifying and disentangling biopsychological and sociocultural factors contributing to high-risk presentations in pediatric populations.” Her overarching goal is to use research to inform the development of more effective, responsive, and accessible interventions for life-threatening presentations, including disordered eating.
“Disparities exist in disordered eating and weight related behaviors, such that they can unduly affect marginalized, minority populations. Many of the current treatment models we have are based on identities that are not representative or responsive to the pediatric patients we see or may not always holistically address other life-threatening concerns (e.g., suicidality). My research focuses on addressing health inequities in high-risk eating and weight-related disorders by identifying risk and protective factors contributing to these presentations,” explains Kamody. “I aim to uncover the factors that impact differences in response to treatment,” she adds.
Her passion is quite evident when she speaks about her work, as well as through her more than 35 publications, and over 50 conference presentations in her early career. She currently has forthcoming chapters focused on evidence-based adaptations for disordered eating in youth with diverse presentations and has been invited to speak nationally and internationally on identity-centered and culturally responsive clinical research in high-risk eating disorder populations. Through YNHH, she consults to pediatric hospital staff caring for the most medically fragile patients, and with providers across mental health and pediatric community settings encountering am increase in such severe cases. In addition to her primary appointment at YCSC, she holds secondary appointments in the Departments of Pediatrics and Psychiatry.
As part of her faculty role at the YCSC, Kamody facilitates talks and seminars on practices of cultural humility in pediatric psychology. Embedded within the Treatment Resistant Depression Clinic, she serves as a psychologist on intravenous ketamine and esketamine trials for depression and suicidality in youth, with refractory presentations. This includes ongoing therapy sessions with youth with severe depression and suicidality and their families. In addition, in her role as a pediatric psychologist she is embedded within the pediatric endocrine team, serving as an attending psychologist in the growing adolescent bariatric surgery program.
Disparities exist in disordered eating and weight related behaviors, such that they can unduly affect marginalized, minority populations. My research focuses on addressing health inequities in high-risk eating and weight-related disorders by identifying risk and protective factors contributing to these presentations.
Rebecca Kamody, PhD
Kamody shares that she has a passion for advocating for systemic interventions for youth with obesity, and her endocrine collaborations include ongoing research and consultative collaborations with the Yale Gender Program (YGP). Through her affiliation with the Yale Department of Psychiatry, she co-instructs seminars on implementing dialectical behavior therapy (DBT) and supervises fellows within YGP and the DBT Intensive Outpatient Program.
“The ongoing focus of my research and clinical work is on developing more responsive, inclusive, and accessible intervention for high-risk adolescents with complex, protracted presentations. This ranges from the building of our eating disorder program, to working with youth with treatment resistant suicidality, as well as youth and their families with elevated weight who have not responded to other medical supports and intervention,” she commented.
On a national level, Kamody serves on editorial boards for the Journal of Pediatric Psychology and Clinical Practice of Pediatric Psychology, the two flagship journals of the Society of Pediatric Psychology. In addition, she serves on the Diversity Board of the Society of Pediatric Psychology, putting forth initiatives for pediatric psychologists across the country and advocating for marginalized and underrepresented populations in the field of pediatric psychology.
Over the next five years, Kamody plans to focus on developing and growing the interdisciplinary ambulatory eating disorder program. “I aim to develop a program that is innovative and novel from other current treatment models to serve all youth inclusive of diverse identities and move forward more responsive care models.” In addition to building this ambulatory program, she plans to bolster the systematic growth of the program by continuing with consultative and educational activities to ensure an integrated care model that prioritizes service leadership and training for all involved.
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