LCDR Mary C. Vance, MD, MSc
Assistant Professor, Department of Psychiatry
Uniformed Services University
Scientist, Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress
Dr. (LCDR) Mary Vance serves as Chief Psychiatrist/Director of Behavioral Health for the United States Coast Guard, Pacific Area. In this role, she develops and implements national behavioral health policy for the Coast Guard, acts as the senior subject matter expert for Pacific Area, and oversees behavioral health service delivery across all Pacific Area clinics and operational assets. In addition, she is the only Pacific Area flight psychiatrist.
Dr. Vance also holds an appointment as Assistant Professor of Psychiatry at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS) and as Scientist at the Center for the Study of Traumatic Stress (CSTS) in Bethesda, Maryland. Immediately prior to commissioning with the United States Public Health Service in 2021, Dr. Vance instructed and mentored active duty medical students across the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Public Health Service at USUHS. She also served as an attending psychiatrist at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, where she provided care to hospitalized patients on the Psychiatry Consultation-Liaison Service and clinically supervised Army and Navy psychiatry residents. In addition, Dr. Vance was a principal investigator and consultant at CSTS, in which role she led projects studying the impact of trauma and stress on military service members and healthcare workers, and provided leadership consultation on disaster behavioral health to military, federal, and local agencies. Dr. Vance also previously served as a psychiatrist at the VA Ann Arbor’s primary care/mental health integration clinic and posttraumatic stress disorder specialty clinic, and at Massachusetts General Hospital’s Home Base Program for veterans and service members.
Dr. Vance received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Brown University and a Doctor of Medicine degree from the State University of New York Downstate College of Medicine. She completed a residency in psychiatry at the Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital/McLean Hospital Psychiatry Residency Program. Post-residency, Dr. Vance also completed an advanced fellowship with the National Clinician Scholars Program at the University of Michigan, where she was awarded a Master of Science degree and received formal training in health services research, health policy, leadership, and communication. She is a Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association and has served on its Committee on Wellbeing and Burnout, Committee on the Psychiatric Dimensions of Disasters, Council on Advocacy and Government Relations, and Board of Trustees, among others.