Dr. C. Virginia O’Hayer

Thomas Jefferson University

Dr. C. Virginia O’Hayer (she/her) is a Linehan Board of Certification DBT Certified Clinician. She serves as a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital. She is the Director of the Jefferson Center City Clinic for Behavioral Medicine, a large training clinic which houses a comprehensive (full model) DBT program. This clinic provides evidence-based practices (including DBT, ACT, CBT, and RO-DBT), to primarily underserved populations, including people with chronic illnesses, living in poverty, and people who identify as members of ethnic/racial/gender/and sexual minorities. Originally from Toronto, Canada, she attended McGill University, receiving a BA (Hons) in Psychology. She received her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from Duke University in 2006. She served on faculty at Duke for 5 years, in the Division of Behavioral Medicine, where she focused on applying DBT to people with chronic health conditions. Virginia and her family moved to Philadelphia in 2012, and ever since, she has embraced the application and adaptation of DBT to trans/non-binary/gender expansive populations.