Victor Huynh, DO
Dr. Victor Huynh is a Walnut Creek psychiatrist who specializes In treating mood, anxiety, OCD, and related disorders using a combination of tools, including interventional psychiatry and pharmacology. He has a strong interest in incorporating cutting-edge therapies like Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS) and esketamine nasal spray into his treatment plans for patients.
More about Victor Huynh, MD
Dr. Victor Huynh was initially introduced to the path of medicine through his father, a practicing internist. With the dream of becoming a primary care physician, he ventured on the premed route for undergrad, majoring in neurobiology, physiology, and behavior. This exposed him to the study of the human mind, where he continued to gravitate toward during medical school. Through interactions with his patients and his own personal relationships, he discovered how distressing and disabling mental illness can be. He also experienced the profound gratification of building a relationship, providing unwavering support, and utilizing his skillset as a psychiatrist to change an individual’s life.
Dr. Huynh has a collaborative and holistic patient care approach with an emphasis on cultural understanding. Training in Hawaii, a culturally diverse population, influenced his view of a largely paternalistic approach common with Western medicine. He believes that to truly collaborate on a comprehensive and evidence-based treatment plan, he must emphasize the individual’s experience, culture, and values, in the context of their environment and biology.
For Dr. Victor Huynh, our current fundamental understanding of psychiatric disorders may be limited, and this has been reflected in past treatment options. To him, no one size fits all and he will use all the tools at his disposal to treat his patients, especially those refractory to our first-line therapies such as medications alone. The development of TMS therapy has demonstrated excellent efficacy and tolerability. Esketamine treatments provides a rapid response, uncommon in psychiatry and he views this as a forerunner to the return of psychedelic medicine.
He joined Mindful Health Solutions in the Fall of 2021.
Personal Interests
Dr. Huynh was born and raised in San Jose, where his family continues to reside. Family and social support are important to him. The heterogeneous cultures of the Bay Area always fascinated him, with a strong innovative and technological culture overlying highly diverse ethnic communities, which has been instrumental in his own development, worldview, and personal interests. Outside of work, he loves traveling and experiencing new cultures, activities, and foods. He enjoys exploring the outdoors, hiking, and camping. He also loves cooking and fermenting foods/beverages.
Education & Experience
Dr. Huynh completed his Bachelor of Science in Neurobiology, Physiology, and Behavior from the University of California Davis in Davis, CA.
He received his medical degree from Touro University in Henderson, Nevada, where he was awarded his Doctor of Osteopathic Medicine. The degree emphasized a whole-person approach to treatment and care, and physicians listening and partnering with their patients to help them get healthy and stay well.
He completed his residency in psychiatry in the Hawaii Residency Programs at the University of Hawaii Department of Psychiatry in Honolulu. He trained in a community program with a large culturally diverse population. During his program, he completed clinical rotations in various settings including inpatient, outpatient, emergency, consult-liaison, addiction, geriatric, child and adolescent, correctional, community, collaborative care, and Veteran’s Affairs. In addition to several leadership positions throughout his residency, during his fourth year, he served as chief resident in a leadership and administrative role. He worked as a liaison between residents and residency program leadership addressing education, patient care, systems, recruitment, and resident wellness. He also provided lectures and didactic sessions for third-year medical students on psychiatry clinical rotations.
Certifications & Memberships
- As Seen on Psychology Today
- Osteopathic Medical Board of California, License Number 20A18750
- Member, American Psychiatric Association
Publications
Takeshita, J., Cho, D., Huynh, V. Gomes, I. Geriatrics. In T. Thrasher. Primer on Emergency Psychiatry. Oxford University Press. New York, New York. (Submitted for Review, 2021).
Agapoff IV, J.R., Olson, D., Huynh, V., White, S. Rapid and Sustained Resolution of Risperidone Associated Hyperprolactinemia and Galactorrhea with Low Dose Lurasidone. The Journal of Clinical Psychopharmacology (2020) 40(4): 410-412. DOI:10.1097/JCP.0000000000001230