Alice Psirakis Diacosavvas

Alice Psirakis Diacosavvas received her Master’s degree in Social Work from Columbia University in 1999, after completing her BSW at Adelphi University in 1998, along with a major in Spanish. Upon graduating from Columbia University, Ms. Diacosavvas joined the United States Army Reserve and was commissioned as a 1st Lieutenant in the Medical Service Corps. She served in the U.S. Army Reserve as a commissioned officer from 1999-2008, and was promoted to the rank of Captain. She served as a troop social worker in the 344th Combat Support Hospital out of Fort Totten, New York, participating in humanitarian medical missions to El Salvador (2004) and Nicaragua (2003). Simultaneously, she worked as a bilingual public health social worker for five years, specializing in women’s reproductive health issues in underserved communities in Brooklyn.

In 2004, Captain Diacosavvas was mobilized to active duty for Operation Enduring Freedom for three years, serving as the Officer-in-Charge of Army Behavioral Health Services at Fort Dix, New Jersey, where she performed Fitness for Duty psychological evaluations and provided mental health services to hundreds of troops deploying to and returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. While in the Army, Captain Diacosavvas treated soldiers suffering from combat trauma, depression, anxiety, military sexual trauma, readjustment issues, family discord, and personality disorders. Since her discharge from the Army in 2008, she has continued her work with veterans in the New York area, along with lecturing and publishing essays on the psychological impact of war.

Captain Diacosavvas has been an adjunct instructor at St. John’s University since 2002, where she teaches an Introduction to Social Work course. She has also taught at the NYU Silver School of Social Work, where she developed and taught a clinical course on military culture and treatment for returning veterans and their families. In 2012, Captain Diacosavvas was selected to present her paper at an international trauma conference at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel, illustrating a new treatment modality she and a colleague developed for treating traumatized Iraq/Afghanistan combat veterans. Captain Diacosavvas joined the Department of Veterans Affairs/Nassau Vet Center in 2009 and currently works as a licensed social worker treating combat veterans of all war eras for a variety of psychological health problems, including Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, depression, anxiety, readjustment issues, and marital stress.