Rosaura Orengo-Aguayo, PhD, is a Professor and bilingual (Spanish & English) licensed Clinical Psychologist at the National Crime Victims Research & Treatment Center, within the Department of Psychiatry & Behavioral Sciences, at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC). She completed her BA in psychology at the University of Puerto Rico, her MA and PhD at the University of Iowa, and her internship and an NIMH postdoctoral fellowship in traumatic stress research at MUSC.
She directs the Puerto Rican Center for Trauma Training & Research, a SAMHSA-funded program aimed at capacity building, resource sharing, technical support, and training in evidence-based trauma-focused interventions and telehealth as a service delivery modality. Her research focuses on addressing disparities in access to mental health care among trauma-exposed, underserved youth in low-resourced and post-disaster contexts in the US, Latin American and the Caribbean. Her team has published several seminal publications on the impact of disasters on youth and teacher mental health (JAMA Network Open & JOTS), the implementation and dissemination of in-person and telehealth delivery of Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) in Latin America and US (American Psychologist), and she is a co-author in the first telehealth manual available in Spanish (Manual de Telesalud Mental).
She is a nationally certified trainer in Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT), Psychological First Aid (PFA), and Skills for Psychological Recovery (SPR), and has expertise in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PE). Dr. Orengo-Aguayo is licensed in South Carolina (1474), Louisiana (1604), Texas (40311), Puerto Rico (7658) and PSYPACT APIT (18723).
Dr. Orengo-Aguayo co-directs the World Changers Lab, with Dr. Regan W. Stewart, whose mission is to “change the world, one child at a time.” She is passionate about mentoring the next generation of mental health professionals to be world changers who lead with cultural humility and values-driven behavior.