Dr. Magera’s

While in residency training years ago a supervisor responded to a similar question with “get to know your patients”. This simple statement has remained with me for the past decade and in my mind implies so much. I view individuals from a developmental perspective and assess how emotional, cognitive, and behavioral factors impact their quality of life and their ability to successfully navigate various developmental life milestones.

Yes, I am a big proponent of psychotherapy. I attended medical school in order to have a firm grounding in the biological aspects of psychiatric distress, but I’ve also been practicing psychotherapy for the past ten years and feel it has tremendous value. While individuals with more severe symptoms often improve with medication, I feel many who only receive medication are receiving suboptimal care and missing out on an opportunity to bring meaningful changes to their lives.

While I specialize in couples therapy, I also treat a range of conditions, including but not limited to anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, and obsessive-compulsive disorder.

Couples therapy is an area of special interest for me. I find many of my patients’ feelings of dissatisfaction with their lives are at least in part due to the absence of or poor quality of significant romantic relationships. When couples enter into treatment, I find many have developed stereotyped views of one another and have become stuck in destructive patterns of communication. Often both individuals feel misunderstood and unsure how to restore intimacy in their relationship. Couples therapy involves an assessment of the psychology of both individuals and an analysis of how their personality styles interact. The goal is for couples to develop a clear understanding of their interpersonal dynamic, improve communication to foster a sense of empathic understanding, and to figure out what aspects of themselves and their partners they may need to either accept or change.