Dr. Paula Levine

Psychologist

Dr. Paula Levine was born in Canada, where she was a clinical social worker in Toronto. She moved to South Florida, where she earned a PhD in psychology from the University of Miami in 1981. She launched two Miami-based practices, one focusing on agoraphobia and the other on anorexia and bulimia, before relocating to the Gables in 1995 with a women’s resource and counseling center, in partnership with Dr. Susan Scholz-Rubin. Since then she has focused on eating disorders, phobias and relationships – all of which, she says, come under the heading of “anxiety disorders.”

Latest Achievement

This coming year Dr. Levine will celebrate her 25th anniversary of serving the Coral Gables community, where her practice employs 15 therapists, three psychiatrists, a full-time nutritionist and three support staff. She also does programs on the new Baptist Health South Florida’s “Health Channel” (in partnership with WPBS) and is a regular contributor to “Smart Life” on the same channel.

What She Says

“I continue to focus on phobias, because we don’t have a ton of experts in town treating this,” she says. “A lot of people don’t understand that phobias are not the fear of the things, but a fear of having a panic attack in that place, like on an airplane, and then being trapped.” She now works with something called ACT, or Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, and is well grounded in mindfulness meditation as a treatment for anxiety and depression. Among her recent cases is a 32-year-old patient who wants to get pregnant but suffers from emetophobia, or fear of vomiting, which is often a part of morning sickness during pregnancy. “What gives me the most satisfaction,” she says, “is the number of people we have trained over the years.”