GW Memory Clinic Care Providers
Tania Alchalabi, MD
Dr. Tania Alchalabi is an Assistant Professor of Medicine who has been with The GW Medical Faculty Associates since 2013. After her residency in Family Medicine she did her Geriatrics Fellowship at GW and later joined the department as a faculty member. Her particular interests in Geriatrics are memory and post acute/long term care. She codirects the Geriatrics outpatient memory clinic, provides mentor ship to Geriatrics fellows, medical students in outpatient and transitions of care arenas. She also teaches pre clinical courses in the school of medicine. She has publications about transitions of care and is an active participant in clinical research about memory disorders.
Christina Prather, MD
Dr. Christina Prather is an internist and geriatrician with the GW Medical Faculty Associates and an assistant professor of medicine at The George Washington University School of Medicine & Health Sciences.
Dr. Prather is interested in helping patients age well and remain well during acute illnesses. She enjoys developing continuity relationships with older adults early on to optimize quality of life during the aging process. In her role as a memory specialist, she focuses on improving quality of life for patients and families with memory loss. She also leads GW's inpatient geriatric program and is an active faculty member for the Center for Trauma and Critical Care. Hospitalizations can be stressful for patients and their loved ones. Dr. Prather believes that geriatricians play an important role in inpatient care through optimizing inpatient geriatric specialty care, minimizing loss of function during acute illness, supporting families in understanding their loved one's illness or injury, and assisting with comprehensive transitions out of the hospital.
In addition to caring for patients, Dr. Prather is passionate about sharing her love for older adults with other members of the patient care team. She is an active faculty member at the GWU School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Her goals include training the next generation of health care providers to better meet the unique medical needs of our aging population. She is a proud recipient of the James Bryan award from the University of North Carolina which is awarded to clinicians who are recognized for their compassion, clinical skills, and bedside manner.
Louisa Whitesides, MD
Dr. Louisa Whitesides is an internist and geriatrician at GW Medical Faculty Associates and a new member of the faculty at The George Washington University School of Medicine & Health Sciences. She completed her medical degree at Emory University School of Medicine, internal medicine residency at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, and geriatrics fellowship at George Washington University.
As part of the Geriatrics and Palliative care Department, Dr. Whitesides provides primary care, house calls, memory care, and inpatient consultations. Her areas of interest include medical education, safe transitions among care settings, and ethics in aging. She teaches both medical students and residents in the outpatient and inpatient setting about comprehensive care and clinical decision making for older adults. She is passionate about educating future physicians on the importance of specialized care for older adults. She has published multiple articles in research ethics, palliative care, and medical humanities. Dr. Whitesides is interested in the diagnosis and management of the memory disorders and plans to follow her patients with memory disorders throughout the continuum of care and assist caregivers in the process.
Stephanie Clark, LICSW
Licensed Clinical Social Worker
Stephanie Clark is a Licensed Independent Clinical Social Worker in the District of Columbia. Ms. Clark came joined The George Washington University Medical Faculty Associates in the Division of Geriatrics and Palliative Care Medicine in 2013. Ms. Clark provides patients and families with long term planning consultation, information and referrals to appropriate community resources, financial and/or healthcare resources and collaborates with representatives of the community to enable patients to resolve non-medical problems.
In 2016, Ms. Clark became the social work faculty advisor for The George Washington University’s Interdisciplinary Student Hotspotting Learning Collaborative in partnership with the Camden Coalition.
In 2017, Ms. Clark became a Clinical Instructor in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at The George Washington University. Ms. Clark co-instructs a course as a professional development mentor for medical students at GW.
Ms. Clark graduated in 2010 from The University of Alabama with Masters Degree in Social Work. Ms. Clark’s concentration was on children and families/healthcare, and completed a field placement with the HSC Pediatric Center, in Northeast, DC.
Ms. Clark completed her undergraduate at Freed-Hardeman University, graduating in 2007 with a Bachelors Degree in Social Work. Ms. Clark’s concentration was on children and families/adoption. Ms. Clark completed two adoption field placements one focusing on international adoptions and the other with “hard-to-place” adoptions.
Prior to the transition to geriatrics, Ms. Clark has three years of experience in foster care working as an adoption specialist, foster parent trainer, child counselor and case manager. She has experience working with families in crisis and difficult situations.
A native of Alabama, Ms. Clark has been living in the Washington, DC area in 2010 and is enjoying life on the East Coast. She is active in her local church, where she volunteers in the children’s education program, women’s ministry, and mission work in Honduras.
Ryan Powell, RN
Nurse Navigator
Ms. Ryan Powell joined the Division of Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine in July 2019. Her role in this division as a registered triage nurse is to assists older adult in our outpatient practice with clinical concerns, medication needs, and other support as concerns arise. As an essential part of the Memory Clinic team, Ms. Powell helps new patients establish care with our team and provides ongoing support for clinical questions about memory care. She enjoys assisting older adults with navigating throughout the GW MFA system and beyond to meet their medical needs.