Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)

Our Team

An effective Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction program requires teachers who are themselves firmly grounded in the practice of mindfulness meditation. Each member of our current team of teachers in the MBSR program at Duke Integrative Medicine holds over 10 years of meditation experience in addition to significant personal experience with yoga or other forms of mindful movement and has a well-established daily meditation practice. Our teachers have a master's degree or higher in health, psychology, education, communication, or a related field. In addition, they have all completed professional training programs in MBSR and have attended multiple intensive mindfulness meditation retreats

Jeffrey Brantley, MD - Director of Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction; Consulting Associate, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences

Dr. Brantley is one of the founding faculty members of Duke Integrative Medicine, where he started the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program in 1998. He is also a member of the Community of Scholars of the Center for Spirituality, Theology, and Health at Duke University. He is a Consulting Associate in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke Medical Center. He teaches intensive courses on mindfulness meditation and conducts extensive experiential programs and group lectures.

Dr. Brantley completed his psychiatry residency at the University of California at Irvine Medical Center. He is Board Certified in psychiatry and and was elected as a “Distinguished Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association” in 2008. He worked for 14 years in community mental health and private practice. Dating back to medical school, meditation has been a focal point of Dr. Brantley's private life, as well as an integral part of his work with people seeking healing in their lives.

Dr. Brantley has participated in many intensive meditation retreats, practicing with a variety of teachers, including Joan Halifax, Thich Nhat Hanh, Larry Rosenberg, Christina Feldman, and members of the Amaravati Buddhist monastic community. He has also completed the professional training for Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction offered by Jon Kabat-Zinn and Saki Santorelli. Dr. Brantley is the author of Calming Your Anxious Mind: How Mindfulness and compassion can free you from anxiety, fear, and panic and is the co-author, with Wendy Millstine, of the Five Good Minutes series and Daily Meditations for Calming Your Anxious Mind.

Mary Matthews Brantley, MA, LMFT - Teacher, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program

Mary Matthews Brantley has been practicing meditation for over 25 years. She has done many intensive retreats and her teachers have included Sharon Salzberg, Joseph Goldstein, Larry Rosenberg, Rodney Smith, Ruth Denison, Joan Halifax, and Thich Nhat Hanh. She has been an instructor in the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction program at Duke Integrative Medicine since 2000. She has a master’s degree in psychology from Pepperdine University of California.

In addition to teaching she has developed and taught a course based on loving-kindness meditation. She is co-author of The Gift of Loving-Kindness: 100 meditations on Compassion, Forgiveness, and Generosity from New Harbinger Publications.

Phyllis Hicks, D-Min, NCLPC - Psychotherapist; Teacher, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program

Phyllis Hicks is a psychotherapist, meditation teacher and minister. She directs the Pastoral Care and Counseling Institute, a nonprofit in Durham, NC and offers psychotherapy, Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy and clinical training.  For twenty-five years she has melded eastern and western understandings of psychology and contemplative practice, studying with a variety of western Vipassana teachers since 1999.  She trained intensively with Gregory Kramer in the practice of Insight Dialogue since 2004 and teaches Insight Dialogue retreats internationally. She is a guiding teacher for Triangle Insight and faculty for the Metta Foundation’s Whole Life Program.

Julie Kosey, MS, PCC, RYT - Integrative Health Coach; Teacher, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction

Julie is credentialed as a Professional Certified Coach (PCC) through the International Coach Federation. She is also a certified health coach. She has supported people with health behavior change since the 1980’s and specifically in a coaching capacity for the past 10 years. Over the years, Julie has consulted with companies to create nationally award-winning worksite wellness programs. She has offered health coaching to employees both individually and in groups, showing positive outcomes in worksite wellness pilot programs. People have lost weight, quit smoking, become more physically active, managed stress more effectively, and created better work/life balance.

While she has provided health coaching in many different settings, she began working with Duke Integrative Medicine as part of a worksite wellness initiative in 2004. Within Duke, Julie has served as Integrative Health Coaching Manager helping to define the role of coaching within a healthcare system. She played a key role in the creation of the Duke Integrative Health Coach Professional training and been a co-leader and core instructor in the foundational and certification programs, supporting new health coaches in developing their skills.

Julie has co-presented Duke’s health coaching research at the International Coach Federation (ICF) conference. She has remained current with health coaching developments on a national level by attending ICF events, the National Wellness Conference, the Harvard Coaching Conference, and the Health Coaching Executive Forum. She will be presenting a workshop on the use of coaching skills to support mindfulness practice at the Investigating and Integrating Mindfulness in Medicine, Health Care, and Society: 9th Annual International Scientific Conference for Clinicians, Researchers and Educators in April 2011.

Julie is also a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) Teacher for Duke Integrative Medicine. She began teaching MBSR through Rex Healthcare in 1996 and has also taught for the University of North Carolina’s Program on Integrative Medicine, Duke Raleigh Hospital and a number of other organizations. She originally trained with Dr. Jon Kabat-Zinn and Dr. Saki Santorelli from the University of Massachusetts Medical Center and has participated in numerous intensive retreats and trainings with various teachers since then including Sylvia Boorstein, Rodney Smith, and Sharon Salzberg among many other less-known but very experienced teachers. Julie has developed a strong level of competence teaching mindful movement by becoming a Certified Kripalu Yoga Teacher in 1999 and pursuing numerous advanced yoga teacher trainings since that time. She has been registered through the Yoga Alliance (RYT) since its inception.

Julie’s academic credentials include an MS in Wellness Management with minors in Business and Counseling, a BA in Psychology, and a Graduate Certificate in Alternative Health and Healing.

She blends all of these aspects of her background to continue to forge the frontier of wellness, creating new possibilities for health and well-being for individuals and organizations.

Maya McNeilly, PhD - Teacher, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program

Maya McNeilly is a licensed clinical psychologist with nearly thirty years of clinical, research, and teaching experience, including full time faculty at Duke University Medical Center Departments of Psychiatry, Medical Psychology, Behavioral Medicine, and the Center for Aging.  She currently teaches MBSR Foundation courses and a Graduate course in Interpersonal Mindfulness through Duke Integrative Medicine.

Dr. McNeilly has practiced meditation since childhood in Buddhist, Hindu, Sikh, and Judeo-Christian Contemplative traditions. Since 1982, she has formally studied and practiced Mindfulness in the Vipassana, Zen, and Judeo-Christian contemplative traditions with teachers in the United States (Joan Halifax, Larry Rosenberg, Christina Feldman, Andy Olendzki, Mu Soeng, Pat Hawk, Nelson Foster, Sharon Salzberg, Joseph Goldstein, Jack Kornfield), India, China, Nepal, Tibet and Israel, and has done a number of intensive long-term retreats in the U.S. and Asia.  She also completed several Mindfulness Trainings for Professionals with Jon Kabat-Zinn and Saki Santorelli; has integrated mindfulness into her psychotherapy practice since 1982; taught MBSR at Duke and Durham Regional Hospital since 1998; and co-facilitated the Mindfulness Training for Professionals at Duke with Dr. Jeffrey Brantley, Director of the Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program at Duke; served as faculty for the North Carolina Foundation for Alcohol and Drug Studies, training professionals to incorporate mindfulness training into addiction treatment; and offered trainings on Mindfulness and Psychotherapy to professionals at the North Carolina Psychological Association conferences.

Clinically, Dr. McNeilly practices psychotherapy at Holly Springs Wellness, www.HollySpringsWellness.com, which is a collaborative network of caring practitioners whose mission is to promote Integrative health and well being in the Triangle and surrounding area. At present, the services of this network include psychotherapy; energetic and spiritual approaches to healing, creative expressive arts, bodywork, physical therapy, nutritional counseling, horticulture therapy, and animal assisted therapy as adjuncts to psychotherapy. Dr. McNeilly has also consulted in the corporate sector, developing and delivering work-site wellness programs for a number of Fortune 500 companies.

Academically, Dr. McNeilly has conducted research since 1982, investigating the effects of stress and racism on blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, and renal sodium handling, along with developing instruments to measure perceptions of racism among ethnic populations and experiences of death and dying.  This research has been presented at national and international conferences, and published in scientific journals such as the Journal of the American Medical Association, the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, Psychophysiology, Health Psychology, Hypertension, Circulation, along with a number of published book chapters.

This research has also been cited in national newspapers and magazines such as Oprah, Men's Health, Ms., Jet, Heart and Soul, Essence, and broadcast on national and local radio and television programs. In addition, Dr McNeilly has taught and mentored a number of undergraduate and graduate students at Duke, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, North Carolina Central University, and Wayne State University.

Philanthropically, Dr McNeilly and her husband established a non-profit, charitable 501 (c) 3 foundation, called the Hope James Foundation, www.HopeJamesFoundation.org, whose mission is to support humanitarian, spiritual, and educational causes. Donations are welcome, and 100% of all proceeds go directly to those in need; none are used for administrative or salary purposes, since all staff and services are volunteer-based.

Jeanne van Gemert, MFA, LMBT, MA, LPC - Mind/Body Therapist

Jeanne van Gemert is a Mind/Body Therapist utilizing Body-Centered and Expressive Arts modalities as well as Mindfulness Meditation. Jeanne assists individuals and groups to understand, transform and integrate their emotions, beliefs, thoughts and spirit.

Using skilled attention, Jeanne offers collaborative multi-modality interventions that promote the unfolding of individuals' psyches and provide deeply meaningful experiences. Jeanne has been an Instructor in the Duke Integrative Medicine Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program since 1999 and is a graduate of the Community Dharma Leader training program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center.

Jeanne holds an MFA in Sculpture from Syracuse University and an MA in Counseling Psychology from Lesley University with specializations in Holistic Health, the Expressive Therapies of Art, Movement and Sand Tray work, and Group Dynamics. She received Bodywork training at the Baltimore Holistic Health Center and is certified in CranioSacral Therapy, Zero Balancing and Massage. She is a graduate of the Barbara Brennan School of Healing and has trained in other body energy systems and shamanic practices.

Ron Vereen, MD - Teacher, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program

Ron Vereen is a board-certified psychiatrist with a private practice in Durham, NC, and serves as a Consulting Associate in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University. A practitioner of mindfulness meditation since 1992, he participated in a professional training in Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction with Jon Kabat-Zinn and Saki Santorelli, and has been teaching in the Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Program at Duke Integrative Medicine since 1999. In addition, he completed the Community Dharma Leader Program though Spirit Rock Meditation Center in 2007, and has been teaching introductory meditation classes throughout the community, along with leading a weekly sitting group in Durham. His interests are in exploring the interface between contemplative practices and Western psychology.

Riitta H Rutanen Whaley, MS, MSPH – Teacher, Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction Program

Riitta H. Rutanen Whaley is a health professional with a comprehensive educational background and professional experience in the health sciences and integrative body-mind approaches/therapies,  including stress reduction, yoga, Reiki, and meditation.  Riitta has studied, worked, and lived for extended periods in Europe, the U.S., South Asia, and the Middle East, serving in various capacities, including as an officer of various governmental and international organizations.  She has maintained a regular meditation practice since 1987.  Over the past 11 years she has engaged in private teaching practice, guiding individuals from diverse ethnic and cultural backgrounds and with varying degrees of physical health in the practical application of mindfulness-based techniques to cope with bodily limitations and/or to mitigate the stresses of modern life.

Riitta holds a Master of Science in Environmental Health Sciences from the University of Eastern Finland, and a Master of Science in Public Health from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Gillings School of Global Public Health.   She is a registered yoga teacher with Yoga Alliance (USA), having earned her yoga teacher certificate at Yogalife (India), and is a member of the Himalayan Institute Teachers Association (USA), as well as the International Association of Yoga Therapists. Her training in mindfulness includes four professional Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction intensives from University of Massachusetts Medical School’s Center for Mindfulness (including one led by Jon Kabat-Zinn and Saki Santorelli), Duke Integrative Medicine, and University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as well as a number of silent meditation retreats.

Riitta is the founder of Yoga for Life LLC, where her work is grounded in a range of mindfulness and awareness enhancing approaches, including the application of  therapeutic yoga for clients with health challenges. She has personally experienced meditation and yoga to be invaluable tools for dealing with intense pain and the limitations it imposes on everyday life.  This approach has been informed by her intensive yoga therapy training at Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram (India), Himalayan Institute (USA), and Auroville (India). She has produced a mindfulness practice CD, Trusting the Experience I, for home use.