DR. HILYA TEHRANI
Clinical Psychologist
Psy24271
Uncovering the reasons why children are experiencing challenges and collaborating with parents to support them based on these insights is Dr. Hilya’s greatest mission and passion. For over 20 years, she has worked with children and teens with the goal of gaining a deeper understanding of their social, emotional, and learning needs, and passing along this awareness to families and to the kids themselves. From this place of understanding, it becomes possible to move towards creating meaningful changes and implementing supports to foster your child's growth and maximize his or her potential.
Some children present with more outward behavioral challenges as a result of neurodevelopmental differences or personal histories, while others turn these same difficult to manage emotions inwards and experience heightened anxiety, low self-esteem, feelings of helplessness and depressed mood. Testing and therapy are the two avenues by which we can determine how parents and educators can best show up for the child’s individual needs.
Conducting psycho-educational evaluations provides a wealth of information regarding how a child learns and the kind of environment and supports they need to do well in school. Testing can uncover hidden learning, processing, or attentional issues, or identify autism. In addition to providing testing services, Dr. Hilya maintains a small caseload of therapy cases. In this way, her conceptualization of children’s socio-emotional needs in the process of providing therapy also informs her evaluations. She is more alert for signs and symptoms of mood disorders but can also provide more tailored recommendations regarding how to support a child who is experiencing poor self-efficacy, difficulty managing their emotions, or disruptive behaviors. Her knowledge of brain-behavior relationships in turn informs how she supports kids therapeutically, not only in teaching self-management skills, but also appreciating how a brain that is wired differently due to trauma or sensory-perceptual differences requires different set of supports and strategies to regulate. Finally, having worked with numerous public and private schools through onsite observations, IEP attendance, and collaboration with educators, Dr. Hilya can help families navigate accessing school-based supports and services. ​
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Dr. Hilya completed her bachelor’s degree at UCLA, received her doctoral degree in Clinical Psychology from Pepperdine University, and received post-doctoral training in conducting psycho-educational evaluations. She has been in private practice since 2010. She is most proud of the two young daughters she has the joy and privilege of raising, and recognizes time and again how humbling parenting can be, even for a pediatric psychologist.