Accepting new clients ages 5 and older for medication management services!

Paige Franzluebbers on December 14, 2021

Immediate openings available for telehealth and in person appointments, including evening hours.

Wenjing (Wendy) Cao is a board certified psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner who offers medication management services to children and adults. Wendy received her BS in nursing from the Ohio State University and later earned her master’s degree as a psychiatric mental health nurse practitioner from the University of Louisville. She has experience in both inpatient and outpatient mental health settings including working with veterans, treating persistent mental health conditions and comorbidity of medical illness. Wendy treats clients with varying diagnoses including anxiety, bipolar, and depressive disorders, ADHD, psychosis, PTSD, schizophrenia, substance use disorders and more.

Wendy accepts the following insurance coverage: Aetna, BCBS, Cigna, Health Partners Universal, Medica, Medicare, Midlands Choice, Optum, UBH, UHC, UMR, Unity Point Health Partners and offers self-pay.

https://secureform.luxsci.com/forms/18045/11426/Cxh3/form.html

Click on the button above to begin the intake process.

 

They told me I wasn’t alone – Elizabeth’s story

Terri Speirs on July 12, 2016

Elizabeth images

Depression does not make a distinction of rich or poor, man, woman or child, yet it can have the same tragic outcome: suicide. However depression is treatable and people can experience the fullness of life. As an example, we offer the story of one of our clients, Elizabeth. (Shared with permission. We’ve changed the name and identifying details to protect privacy.)

If you saw Elizabeth today, you would see a beaming mother of two little boys, embracing the joy and challenges of a growing family along with her husband. But it wasn’t always that way. Life was bleak for Elizabeth.

Elizabeth has suffered anxiety and depression since she was a young girl, starting therapy in third grade. Her fears were so dark she didn’t know if she would succeed in school, enter the workforce or continue to live. Psychiatric medication helped curb her mental anguish yet after she married she faced an impossible choice: having children or maintaining health. Elizabeth imagined her life with prescription medication would hurt the baby, and her life without meds might end.

Elizabeth came to the Center during this time of grave discernment. She met with a licensed counselor and the Center’s psychiatry physician assistant (PA). They all worked together to create a treatment plan. Elizabeth learned that there are safe medication options, if she and her husband decided to start a family. They did, and Elizabeth’s clinical team walked with them every step of the way.

The children are now one and three years old. Elizabeth is a working mother and tends to her self-care. Elizabeth continues treatment with her psychiatry PA and speaks fondly of her: “She tells me ‘happy, healthy mommy means happy, healthy baby.’”

Elizabeth is one of more than 4,000 individuals assisted annually at the Center. Approximately 35 percent of our clinical clients utilize a sliding pay scale, thanks to generous donations.

“They told me I wasn’t alone,” said Elizabeth about her clinical team. “They said I wasn’t the only one who experiences this.”