An integrative intensive program designed to treat youth and young adults experiencing complex conditions at the intersection of psychiatry, psychology, and physiology such as neuroinflammatory syndromes (PANDAS/PANS), dysautonomias (POTS), functional disorders (FND), and chronic stress-related.
OUR APPROACH
When physical and psychiatric symptoms overlap, families can find themselves caught between different systems of care—pursuing medical explanations on one side while being told to address anxiety, OCD, emotional distress, or behavior on the other. Our approach starts from a different premise: the mind and body are interconnected, and effective treatment needs to understand and support both.
Our multidisciplinary team brings medical and psychological perspectives together in one coordinated treatment plan. Psychological treatment and behavioral support help young people build the skills needed to regulate their nervous systems, tolerate distress, and return to daily life, while collaboration with medical specialists helps identify and address relevant biological factors.
Treatment is individualized to each young person’s symptoms, developmental stage, medical history, and family context.
PANS & PANDAS
PANS and PANDAS can be especially confusing and overwhelming for families because symptoms may cross the boundaries between physical and mental health. A young person may be experiencing OCD, anxiety, emotional or behavioral changes, and difficulties with everyday functioning while the family is also navigating questions about inflammation, infection, or other biological factors.
Rather than asking families to choose between a medical or psychological understanding of what is happening, our program brings these perspectives together. Treatment addresses the psychological and functional impact of symptoms while coordinating with medical providers around underlying biological concerns.
The goal is not simply symptom reduction. We help young people regain a sense of safety and capability in their bodies and gradually re-engage with school, relationships, activities, and everyday life.
Coordinated medical and psychological care
Our interdisciplinary care team is led by psychiatrist Erika Nurmi, MD, PhD, who has 20 years of experience treating youth with OCD, anxiety, and related disorders. Community West also collaborates with pediatric immunologist J. Patrick Whelan, MD, PhD, through his UCLA Immunology Clinic.
This collaboration allows the psychological team to provide therapeutic and behavioral support while medical providers evaluate and address biological factors—giving families a more integrated understanding of their child’s symptoms and care.
Restore everyday functioning
Complex symptoms can gradually narrow a young person’s life. School becomes difficult. Activities stop. Relationships change. Families may begin organizing daily life around symptoms, flare-ups, avoidance, or fear of making things worse.
Treatment focuses on helping young people safely rebuild their ability to participate in everyday life. Through individual therapy, behavioral coaching, group treatment, experiential activities, and mind-body interventions, clients develop greater capacity to manage symptoms and return to school, work, relationships, and activities that matter to them.
Understand and regulate the nervous system
Young people learn to better recognize what is happening in their bodies and develop practical ways to respond.
Mind-body interventions may include somatic awareness, therapeutic yoga, breathwork, occupational therapy, and education around nutrition, sleep, and lifestyle. These approaches are integrated with psychotherapy, psychiatry, behavioral coaching, and other clinical support rather than treated as separate from them.
Over time, the goal is for clients to internalize these strategies so they can navigate discomfort and distress with greater confidence and independence.
Help families make sense of complex symptoms
When symptoms are confusing or unpredictable, families can understandably become highly focused on finding an explanation or the next intervention. Part of treatment is helping both young people and parents develop a clearer, more coherent understanding of what is happening.
Rather than minimizing physical symptoms or allowing illness to define the young person’s life, we help families hold the complexity of the condition while shifting the focus toward resilience, agency, and recovery.
Support the whole family
Parents are an important part of treatment. Family therapy and parent workshops help caregivers understand when to provide support, when to encourage greater independence, and how to respond to symptoms without unintentionally reinforcing patterns that keep a young person stuck.
Families learn strategies for pacing, communication, reinforcement, and reducing cycles of stress within the family, with the goal of becoming a source of regulation and support throughout recovery.
The goals of the Mind-Body Medicine Program extend beyond reducing symptoms. We want young people to understand their bodies without becoming defined by illness, develop greater emotional and physiological regulation, reconnect with school and social life, and build the confidence and skills they need to function more independently.
Treatment takes place within a compassionate, highly individualized environment where families do not have to choose between taking physical symptoms seriously and addressing their psychological impact. We do both.