Dr. D’Urso earned her B.S. in Psychology (Biology minor) from Fordham University. It was here where she first learned about ERP, a cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) treatment for OCD as a research coordinator in Dr. Dean McKay’s OCD and anxiety lab. She then earned her Ph.D in clinical psychology from Hofstra University. Across her graduate training experiences, Dr. D’Urso gained extensive experience in providing CBT. She has provided CBT across inpatient and outpatient individual and group settings in the treatment of the obsessive-compulsive spectrum, anxiety, mood disorders, psychosis, insomnia, post-traumatic stress, and personality disorders. She focused her dissertation on the use of CBT-Insomnia (CBT-I) as an adjunct to standard CBT for generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), and she often incorporates CBT-I into her treatment strategies across disorders. Although she specializes in the use of ERP, she also incorporates her training in acceptance and commitment therapy (ACT) and dialectic behavior therapy (DBT) as complementary principles in her work.
Dr. D’Urso completed her pre-doctoral internship at the Institute of Living (IOL) in the role of CBT Intern. Here, she trained interdisciplinary teams in CBT, assisting with case conceptualization and implementing behavior plans as a consultant in various hospital divisions. She also created and led various CBT-Insomnia groups in several outpatient programs. Lastly, at IOL’s Anxiety Disorders Center/Center for CBT, her home base, she was able to hone her particular interest in treating OCD through supervised individual and group therapy under the guidance of clinic director Dr. David Tolin and clinical supervisor Dr. Chris Gilliam.
During her post-doctoral fellowship at the Center for Cognitive-Behavioral Psychotherapy in NYC she gained in-depth experience in treating the “pure-O” sub-type of OCD under the supervision of Drs. Steven Phillipson and Ivy Marcus. She has also completed clinical training through Spectrum CBT with Dr. Rebecca Sachs, nationally recognized expert in treating OCD within the autistic population. Dr. D’Urso now sees patients in her own private practice half-time. Additionally, she has worked as a staff psychologist on a half-time basis at the Northwell Health OCD Center at Zucker Hillside Hospital in Glen Oaks, Queens since November 2018. In July 2021, she became an assistant professor in the department of psychiatry at the Donald and Barbara Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra/Northwell and she was promoted to the role of senior psychologist and clinical training coordinator of the Northwell Health OCD Center in April 2022. Her responsibilities include assessment, conducting individual and group therapy, and coordinating recruitment and onboarding and training/professional development needs of doctoral students and psychiatry residents at the OCD Center. A group enthusiast, at the Northwell Health OCD Center Dr. D’Urso leads weekly and monthly maintenance groups, ERP practice groups, and lastly, a weekly family group for patients and loved ones with OCD that she created in 2019. The aim of this group is to educate families and reduce accommodation of OCD symptoms.
From 2019-2021, Dr. D’Urso was also involved in a National Institute of Health (NIH) grant-funded research study sponsored by the Icahn School of Medicine at Mt. Sinai and conducted at 11 transplant centers throughout the USA and Canada. This study found that a tele-health intervention helped increase medication adherence in teens who had have liver transplants and who were not compliant with their immunosuppressant medications, thus reducing the incident of rejection of transplant and related medical and mental health conditions. Over the years, she has participated in numerous other research studies. Dr. D’Urso has also presented at various conferences and has taught several undergraduate psychology courses. Dr. D’Urso is a member of the Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT), the International OCD Foundation (IOCDF), and the NYC CBT Association. She is licensed in New York and New Jersey and has a permanent telehealth registration in Florida.
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