Dr. Matthew Sommons

With over 20 years of experience as a practicing psychiatrist, I have enjoyed working in a variety of clinical settings and with many different types of patients.  This diversified experience has helped mold me into a well-rounded psychiatrist with many different tools at my disposal to help patients recover from psychiatric illness.

I enjoy getting to know as much as I can about each person I see.  I like to use knowledge gleaned from this process to work with the patient on developing a treatment plan that makes sense for them.  I am well versed in treating psychiatric illness with medication, but am also on the conservative side when it comes to prescribing and tend to utilize mostly evidence based treatments.  The field of psychiatry is not “one size fits all” and it is important to not become too focused on any one type of treatment intervention.

When I see someone for an initial psychiatric evaluation, my main objective is gathering information about a patient in a holistic way to make a well informed diagnosis and subsequent treatment plan.  My approach is highly educational in nature and I encourage all patients to take ownership of making their own treatment decisions once education about diagnosis and treatment options have been discussed.  I will also often incorporate psychotherapeutic techniques into the initial evaluation to both add a therapeutic element to the initial evaluation and to assess for whether the person may be a good fit for a given type of psychotherapy.