Kari Stephens

Applications in Social Sciences

Kari Stephens is a clinical psychologist and faculty member in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Washington with a long standing commitment to underserved populations. She is also part of the faculty leadership in the Biomedical Informatics Core of the Institute of Translational Health Sciences and has over a decade of experience in biomedical health informatics  with emphases on data sharing architectures and electronic medical record systems.

She completed her doctorate in 2008 at the University of Washington after completing residency/internship through Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences in the School of Medicine. She has received fellowships and funding from the American Psychological Association’s Minority Fellowship Program, Society for Public Health Education, and the National Institute of Mental Health.

Her current research includes addressing mental health ethnoracial disparities related to posttraumatic stress, particularly in the acute care setting. She is also working within primary care settings to deliver behavioral skills training within Washington State’s Mental Health Integration Program (MHIP) and leads the informatics system development for LC Data QUEST, a project aimed at building data sharing networks across primary care practices serving rural communities.

Integrating her expertise in informatics, she continues to explore the use of informatics innovations in medical settings to promote dissemination of empirically supported mental health treatments. Her clinical expertise includes cognitive and behavioral based psychotherapy, including treatments for depression, anxiety, trauma, and addiction.