Will Barone, PsyD

I'm Dr. Will Barone, a clinical psychologist based in Oakland, CA, and I enjoy working with clients from across the state. I have worked in this field for over a decade, and in my training and practice I have worked in a variety of settings from hospitals and inpatient programs to outpatient psychotherapy and community support programs. In all of these settings, I noticed that many people experienced traditional methods of medication and therapy to not be as successful as they hoped they would be. This led me to focus on investigating new types of treatments that can be more effective in helping clients meet their goals. These experiences have led me to a model of psychotherapy that is about using a client-centered approach and matching therapy style to their needs. I focus on developing understanding of and treating the underlying issues that are often causing the symptoms of challenges, rather than just covering up the issues with medications or coping strategies alone. In my mission to create better treatment for my clients, I have also focused more than a decade of my research and part of my clinical practice on psychedelic-assisted therapies, which are treatments that utilize medications that change the way someone feels and thinks to deepen the process of psychotherapy. I have worked in clinical trials for a number of these medications, including MDMA and psilocybin, and have worked in my clinical practice with Ketamine-Assisted Psychotherapy for over 5 years. This treatment is only appropriate for certain clients, but for those clients I have found this treatment to be a unique approach to accessing deeper parts of themselves than they can reach in normal psychotherapy, helping to get a boost out of depression and anxiety, and creating a window of neuroplasticity that can make changing behaviors and thinking patterns more effective for some time after each treatment. If you have questions about my psychotherapy work or my work with ketamine-assisted psychotherapy, please feel free to write me or ask about it in our consultation call.