Education
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
Chief Residency, Inpatient Psychiatry
1997 – 1998
-
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
Psychiatry Residency Program
1995 – 1997
Bethesda Naval Hospital
Medical Internship
1991 – 1992
University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine
Doctor of Medicine (MD)
1987 – 1991
University of California, Berkeley
Bachelor of Arts (BA), Physiology & Latin-American Literature
1984 – 1987
Certifications
-
American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology
Diplomate
February 2001-Present
-
Southern California Society for Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy
Graduate
December 2006
Professional Experience
-
Geoffrey F. Sternlieb, M.D., Inc.
Psychiatrist
2002 – Present
I work with adults, couples and families on a wide range of emotional difficulties. As a psychiatrist, I am also able to integrate medications into my work when beneficial, but only as a complement to and never as a substitute for the important work of psychotherapy.
UC San Diego Health System, Dept. of Psychiatry
Clinical Faculty
1998 – Present
Duties include leading advanced, pro bono teaching seminars and one-on-one tutorials with junior and senior psychiatry residents as they approach completion of their medical and psychiatric education.
Scripps Health
Staff Psychiatrist
1999 –2002
I worked with adults, couples, and families on a wide range of emotional and relational diff-
iculties. I also integrated medications
into my work where beneficial.
US Navy
General Medical Officer
1992 – 1995
Duties included evaluation of routine and urgent patients in a primary care setting, as well as supervision of staff in managing sick-call, pharmacy, laboratory, and X-ray facilities. I provided medical services in conjunction with humanitarian relief efforts in Honduras
and Somalia.
Education
While my psychiatry training at UCLA was psychodynamically rich, I sensed that there was still a set of patients that I remained unable to fully reach with the tools I had learned. These included patients with ambitious goals and limited time to devote to psychotherapy, as well as those who hadn’t made optimal progress in traditional psychodynamic therapy. It was at that point that I was fortuitously exposed to AB-ISTDP or Attachment-Based Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy. In 2006, I completed a 3 year training fellowship in AB-ISTDP. Unlike standard psychodynamic therapy, AB-ISTDP relies chiefly on non-interpretive techniques. Emphasis is placed on the here-and-now experience of deep emotion. In many cases, AB-ISTDP can lead to dramatic progress in relatively short periods of time even when other treatment modalities have failed.
While my therapy style is flexible and adapted to each patient’s specific needs, goals, and challenges, it is always firmly grounded in the science of attachment. That is to say that our childhood experiences with primary caregivers have a profound influence on the adults we later become; affecting our ways of communicating, being in close relationships, and moment-to-moment self-monitoring and managing of inner emotional states. When these go awry, we are at increased risk of problems with anxiety, depression, anger, relationships, substance abuse, etc. Happily, through careful, attentive, and individualized psychotherapy that is grounded in this science, true transformation can happen and lives can be meaningfully, lastingly, and profoundly changed.
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
Chief Residency,
Inpatient Psychiatry1997 – 1998
David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA
Psychiatry Residency Program
1995 – 1997
Bethesda Naval Hospital
Medical Internship
1991 – 1992
University of Pittsburgh
School of MedicineDoctor of Medicine (MD)
1987 – 1991
University of California, Berkeley
Bachelor of Arts (BA), Physiology & Latin-American Literature
1984 – 1987
Certifications
-
American Board of Psychiatry
and NeurologyDiplomate
February 2001-Present
-
Southern California Society for Intensive Short-Term Dynamic Psychotherapy
Graduate
December 2006
Professional Experience
-
Geoffrey F. Sternlieb, M.D., Inc.
Psychiatrist
2002 – Present
I work with adults, couples and families
on a wide range of emotional difficulties. As a psychiatrist, I am also able to integrate medications
into my work when beneficial, but only as a complement to and never as a substitute for the important work of psychotherapy.
UC San Diego Health System,
Dept. of PsychiatryClinical Faculty
1998 – Present
Duties include leading advanced, pro bono teaching seminars and one-on-one tutorials with junior and senior psychiatry residents
as they approach completion of their
medical and psychiatric education.
Scripps Health
Staff Psychiatrist
1999 –2002
I worked with adults, couples, and families on a wide range of emotional and relational diff-
iculties. I also integrated medications
into my work where beneficial.
US Navy
General Medical Officer
1992 – 1995
Duties included evaluation of routine and urgent patients in a primary care setting, as well as supervision of staff in managing sick-call, pharmacy, laboratory, and X-ray facilities. I provided medical services in conjunction with humanitarian relief efforts in Honduras
and Somalia.