Meet Francesca Rome-Marie, PMHNP-BC

My path to psychiatry has never been a straight line, and I think that's exactly what shapes the care I offer today.

I honed my clinical skills at the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, after years as a certified HIV specialist and primary care provider for the LGBTQIA+ community in Manhattan's Chelsea neighbourhood. I've always been deeply invested in the human experience, and committed to helping people feel genuinely cared for rather than processed.

My interest in holistic wellbeing began long before that, when I trained as a yoga instructor at the Integral Yoga Institute of New York, becoming the youngest certified instructor there at the time.

Philosophy, art and advocacy

At The New School, I earned a Bachelor of Arts in Gender and Sexuality Studies, immersing myself in feminist philosophy and psychoanalytic thought while exploring art and creativity through analogue film photography. That commitment to social justice led me towards sexual health and rights: I served the wider New York medical community as a gynaecological teaching associate and was involved in sex work activism.

Alongside this, I worked with the Harm Reduction Institute and the Anti-Violence Project, and became an on-call emergency room advocate for survivors of intimate partner violence and sexual assault at Beth Israel Emergency Department. Supporting the mental health and wellbeing of survivors remains close to my heart today.

A global perspective

Wanting to widen my impact, I earned a Master's in Disaster Management from the University of Copenhagen while volunteering with Danish Muslim Aid, coordinating aid projects across diverse regions. I also studied with the humanitarian Dame Claire Bertschinger, author of Moving Mountains, while completing a Certificate in Tropical Nursing at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Just as I was beginning interviews with Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders), life took an unexpected turn. I chose instead to build a mental health practice that filled the gap I had experienced first-hand, as a primary care provider and as a patient. That is how Modern Holistic Psychiatry was born.

Somatic work became the missing link between talk therapy and psychiatric care.

One of the most transformative moments in shaping this practice was integrating somatic approaches. They connected my personal and professional experience of talk therapy with psychiatric and medical treatment, opening up a powerful way to work with the mind-body connection. Today it's a cornerstone of how I support people seeking a deeper understanding of their mental health and of themselves.