Women in Business
PANTEA SHARIFI-HANNAUER, MD Owner/Medical Director Pediatric Minds Medical Center 3524 Fashion Way, Suite 104, Torrance 310-540-1630 PediatricMinds.com
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r. Pantea Sharifi-Hannauer is a board-certified child neurologist who is a South Bay native. She is the founder and medical director of Pediatric Minds Medical Center, the Early Childhood Treatment Center (ECTC), Pediatric Minds Family Services and Pediatric Minds Developmental Services. Dr. H, as her team calls her, specializes in helping children with special needs.
Tell us about the Early Childhood Treatment Center.
“The ECTC at Pediatric Minds is a unique program that provides short term, intensive daily treatment to young children with developmental delays, autism, behavioral issues, anxiety, ADHD and other neuro-developmental problems. Our team of specialists includes child psychologists, behavioral therapists, speech and language pathologists, an occupational therapist and other staff that specialize in early child development. The program has been so effective, there often is a four- to six-month waitlist.”
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Why is your program so effective?
“Decades of research have shown that early intervention is most effective in maximizing the child’s developmental potential. This is not only true for patients with autism but also for patients with other forms of developmental delays. Our program is unique and extremely effective because we are multi-disciplinary. All the various disciplines that are part of early interventions for young children work together and provide the treatment simultaneously. We also ensure parent training and education is provided to keep the benefits patients gain.”
What would you like clients to know?
“Pediatric Minds has become a training program for many different specialties including providing internships to psychology students from Alliant University, rotating and visiting medical students and neurology residents in training from UCLA Medical Center. We provide neuropsychological testing, psychotherapy, speech therapy, in-home behavioral support services, parent training and support
services, and social skills classes. We are also developing a nonprofit sector that focuses on research and development.”
How do you give back to your community? “It is critical to keep our community educated on the needs of children with special needs. Education provides acceptance. I have involved my own children (ages 10 and 11) by having them volunteer and help during social skills classes as a peer mentor to our patients. My team and I also participate in community programs and local schools and provide seminars, trainings and lectures to other professionals in the field.”
FAST FACT Dr. Hannauer is on faculty at the UCLA Medical Center, Department of Child Neurology, where she teaches residents and medical students and does research. She also runs an autism and epilepsy clinic at the UCLA, Santa Monica clinic.
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