BPsychol (Hons)

MClinPsy

PhD

MAPS

Fellow of APS College of Clinical Psychologists

MAACBT

Jessamine is a bilingual (English and Mandarin) senior clinical psychologist with 20 years of clinical experience, including 11 years at the Anxiety Treatment and Research Unit, Westmead Hospital, Sydney (4 years as Head of Unit). She has specialist expertise in treating anxiety and related disorders in children, adolescents, adults, and older adults, particularly for concerns related to generalised anxiety, panic attacks, social anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder, and hoarding disorder.

Jessamine’s clinical practice has a strong focus on mental health across the lifespan. In addition to depression and anxiety and related disorders, she has extensive experience of helping clients overcome the following concerns using evidence-based strategies:

-   Children: school refusal, attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD)
-   Adolescents: academic stress, peer relationship issues, perfectionism, ADHD
-   Adults: academic stress in the university context, workplace-related stress, perfectionism, ADHD
-   Older adults: adjustment to retirement, social isolation, loneliness

Jessamine’s PhD research was focused on understanding the cognitive mechanisms underpinning generalised anxiety disorder, pathological worry, and intolerance of uncertainty. This research reflected her deep interest in the intersection of research and clinical intervention. In addition to her clinical practice, Jessamine works as Research Fellow at the Lifespan Health and Wellbeing Research Centre, Macquarie University.

Her research is focused on improving psychological treatment outcomes for older adults experiencing depression and anxiety. She is also conducting research to understand the most effective way to improve social connectedness and to reduce loneliness in older adulthood.

Jessamine is currently leading the Chinese adaptation of an English-language evidence-based psychological intervention for reducing late-life anxiety and depression to ensure it is culturally responsive and linguistically appropriate for Chinese-speaking older adults. She has presented her research findings at national and international conferences. She is also an Associate Editor for an Australian psychology journal.

Jessamine’s peer-reviewed research publications are available here

Jessamine is a clinical supervisor (approved by the Psychology Board of Australia) with a long-standing commitment to training and supervising Provisional Psychologists and Clinical Psychology Registrars since 2008. She has taught into the Master of Clinical Psychology program at Macquarie University and the University of Technology Sydney, delivering lectures on evidence-based practice in the assessment and treatment of psychological disorders. She also has extensive experience of delivering half-day and full-day workshops to mental health professionals and allied health professionals.

Jessamine is passionate about mental health communication, and she regularly delivers invited community talks to raise consumer and professional awareness of anxiety and depression particularly in older age.