Carrie R. McDonald, Ph.D.
Assistant Adjunct Professor of Psychiatry
E-mail: camcdonald@ucsd.edu 
PHONE #: (858) 534-2678
FAX #: (858) 534-1078

Biography
Dr. McDonald received her B.S. in Psychology from Eckerd College in 1997 and her Ph.D. in Clinical and Health Psychology from the University of Florida in 2003, with a specialization in neuropsychology. She completed a predoctoral internship in clinical psychology at UCSD and the V.A. San Diego Healthcare System, with an emphasis in neuropsychological assessment of adults. She then completed pre-doctoral and post-doctoral fellowships awarded by the Epilepsy Foundation/American Epilepsy Society, as well as the UCSD Fellowship in Biological Psychiatry and Neuroscience. She is currently the Principal Investigator of an NIH/NINDS Patient-Oriented Career Development Award (K-23) studying memory and language processing in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy by combining MEG/EEG, and structural MRI.

Research Focus
Dr. McDonald’s research focuses on understanding neuropsychological deficits in patients with intractable epilepsy before and after surgical resection of the epileptic focus. Dr. McDonald holds a K-23 grant from NINDS to explore the timing and localization of language and memory processing in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy by combining MEG/EEG with structural MRI. Her research goals are aligned with the clinical goal of developing and implementing new cognitive/imaging paradigms for clinical use. She is also involved in research using diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to study changes in white matter pathways in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy and in research examining executive dysfunction in patients with frontal lobe epilepsy.

Clinical Focus
Dr. McDonald is a licensed clinical psychologist specializing in neuropsychological functioning of patients with intractable epilepsy. She is particularly interested in the development and implementation of noninvasive methods (i.e., MEG/EEG and fMRI) for identifying areas of eloquent cortex in patients prior to surgical resection of the epileptic focus.

Selected Publications
McDonald, C. R., Swartz, B., Halgren, E., Patell, A., Daimes, R., & Mandelkern, M. (2006). The relationship of regional frontal hypometabolism to executive function: A resting fluorodeoxyglucose PET study of patients with epilepsy and healthy controls. Epilepsy & Behavior, 9(1):58-67.

McDonald, C. R. Delis, D. C., Norman, M. A., Tecoma, E. S., & Iragui, V. J. (2005). Discriminating patients with frontal lobe epilepsy and temporal lobe epilepsy: Utility of a new measure of design fluency. Neuropsychology, 19(6), 806-813.

McDonald, C. R. Delis, D. C., Norman, M. A., Wetter, S. R., Tecoma, E. S., & Iragui, V. J. (2005). Response inhibition and set-shifting in patients with frontal-lobe epilepsy or temporal lobe epilepsy. Epilepsy & Behavior, 7(3), 438-446.

McDonald, C. R., Bauer, R. M., Filoteo, J. V., Grande, L., Roper, S. N., Buchanan, R. J., & Gilmore, R. (2005). Semantic priming in patients with right frontal lobe lesions. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 11, 1-12.

McDonald, C. R., Norman, M. A., Tecoma, E. S., Alksne, J. A., & Iragui, V. J. (2004). Neuropsychological change following gamma knife surgery in patients with left temporal lobe epilepsy. Epilepsy & Behavior, 5(6), 949-957.