Nancy O'Hara MD, MPH, FAAP

Nancy O'Hara MD, MPH, FAAP Dr. Nancy O’Hara's functional medicine practice integrates the care of children with neurodevelopmental disorders and various chronic illnesses.

08/27/2026

Mindfulness is not just for our children.

It is for parents.
It is for practitioners.
It is for all of us who are trying to stay present in the middle of fear, uncertainty, and overwhelm.

When a child is struggling with anxiety, OCD, PANS/PANDAS, or emotional dysregulation, it is very easy for adults to jump ahead.

What does this mean?
Is this a flare?
What if it gets worse?
What do I need to fix?

But sometimes the most supportive thing we can do is come back to the child in front of us, in this moment, without layering every fear or expectation onto them.

Being present does not mean ignoring what is happening.

It means slowing down enough to respond from steadiness instead of panic.

This conversation with Dr. Scott Antoine is from Episode #64 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS: “Treating Anxiety Like a Poison: An ER Doctor’s Approach to OCD.”

I hope it helps families and clinicians think about anxiety with more compassion, more clarity, and less fear.

08/26/2026

Today’s podcast episode we are talking about anxiety, OCD, and practical ways to help children come back into the present moment.

Dr. Scott Antoine makes an important distinction between meditation and mindfulness.

Mindfulness does not have to mean sitting quietly with an empty mind.

For children, it can be as simple as noticing what is right in front of them.

Finding three red things on a walk.

Holding a peach and noticing its color.

Feeling whether it is cold or warm.

Cutting it open and noticing the texture, the smell, the slipperiness, the details.

That kind of presence can help pull the brain out of fear and back into the current moment.

And for anxious children, that matters.

Episode #64 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS is available now: “Treating Anxiety Like a Poison: An ER Doctor’s Approach to OCD.”

If anxiety or OCD has been part of your child’s story, I hope this conversation gives you language, perspective, and a few practical tools to try.

08/25/2026

Tomorrow’s episode is such an important conversation about anxiety, OCD, and how we help children understand what is happening in their own brains.

One of the hardest parts of OCD is that the child often knows the thought or ritual does not make sense.

They know washing again, checking again, asking again, or repeating again is not logical.

But the fear in the body can feel so immediate and so convincing that they feel compelled to do it anyway.

Dr. Scott Antoine gives such a helpful analogy: that moment when you realize your seatbelt is not buckled and your body suddenly panics until you fix it.

For someone with OCD, that urgency can feel like it is happening all the time.

This is why these children need more than reassurance or correction. They need understanding, support, and tools that help them separate themselves from the anxiety without shame.

Episode #64 drops tomorrow: “Treating Anxiety Like a Poison: An ER Doctor’s Approach to OCD.”

If you are a clinician caring for children and adolescents with complex mental health symptoms, you know how often the s...
08/24/2026

If you are a clinician caring for children and adolescents with complex mental health symptoms, you know how often the standard model can fall short.

Anxiety. ADHD. Mood disorders. Neurodiversity. Eating disorders. PANS/PANDAS. Lyme. Mold. Gut dysfunction. Immune dysregulation. Inflammation.

These children deserve more than a symptom checklist.

They deserve clinicians who are trained to ask:

What is driving this child’s symptoms?

What is being missed underneath the surface?

How do nutrition, metabolism, genetics, gut health, immune function, and the environment fit into the picture?

And what can we do to support lasting healing?

That is why I am honored to be part of Dr. James Greenblatt’s Certified Pediatric Functional & Integrative Psychiatry Fellowship.

This 12-month fellowship gives clinicians a comprehensive, root-cause framework for pediatric mental health care, including:

300+ hours of clinical education

50+ CME credits

Monthly mentorship and case discussions

Faculty-led clinical sessions

A supportive professional community

Special events and intensives

Practical tools you can begin applying in practice

Fellows also receive one annual membership to my online program, giving you even more access to education around PANS/PANDAS, neuroinflammation, Lyme, mold, and root-cause care.

If you are ready to expand your clinical toolkit and approach pediatric mental health with more clarity, confidence, and whole-child thinking, I would love to invite you to learn more.

Visit my website for Fellowship details and enrollment information: drohara.com/pedfellowship

08/20/2026

The gut microbiome is one of the most important pieces of the brain-body conversation.

In this episode, Dr. James Adams explains something many families may not realize: a child inherits much of their early gut microbiome from the mother, especially with a vaginal birth.

That early microbial environment may matter deeply for children whose neurodevelopmental symptoms begin very early in life.

For children with autism, this raises important questions about maternal gut health, early-life microbiome development, yeast and bacterial balance, and how microbial metabolites may influence the brain.

And for children with PANS/PANDAS, where symptoms may appear later, the microbiome can still be disrupted by infections, antibiotics, inflammation, diet, immune stress, and other environmental factors.

Different timing. Different triggers. Same reminder:

The gut and brain are connected.

You can listen to Episode #54 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS: “Gut Metabolites and the Brain: What Autism Research Is Revealing” wherever you get your podcasts.

08/19/2026

When we are working with complex illness — mold, Lyme, PANS/PANDAS, neuroinflammation, immune dysfunction — it is rarely enough to ask, “Did this therapy work?”

We also have to ask:

What worked?

What did not work?

At what point in the process?

And what does that tell us about the next step?

That is one of the reasons I appreciated this conversation with Tapley Holland and Elena Herning of TruDOSE.

In complex cases, therapies like ozone, hyperbaric oxygen, platelet therapy, and other integrative tools may all have a place — but the sequencing, dosing, timing, and patient readiness matter tremendously.

The goal is not to throw every tool at the child.

The goal is to understand the therapeutic journey and support the body in the right order.

You can listen to Episode #49 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS: “When the Right Dose Changes Everything” wherever you get your podcasts.

08/18/2026

One of the hardest parts of Lyme disease is what happens when the “standard” story does not match the patient sitting in front of us.

Many people do improve after standard treatment.

But what about the children and adults who do not?

In this conversation with Dr. Tom Moorcroft, we talk about the group that too often gets left out of the discussion — the patients who continue to struggle with fatigue, brain fog, pain, flares, immune dysregulation, or neuropsychiatric symptoms after initial treatment.

Sometimes this is described as post-treatment Lyme syndrome.

But we also have to ask:

Could there still be active infection?

Could there be other infections like bartonella and babesia?

Could the immune system still be dysregulated?

Could we be missing the bigger picture?

This is why Lyme and tick-borne illness require a deeper, more nuanced conversation.

You can listen to Episode #46 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS: “The Most Misdiagnosed Illness in America? A Lyme Expert Explains” wherever you get your podcasts.

I’m honored to be walking with Team OHM for the 2026 Look. Walk — Making Strides for PANS & PANDAS.On October 3rd, I’ll ...
08/17/2026

I’m honored to be walking with Team OHM for the 2026 Look. Walk — Making Strides for PANS & PANDAS.

On October 3rd, I’ll be walking in Boston to help raise awareness and support for the children, young adults, and families whose lives have been deeply affected by PANS/PANDAS. I will also be one of the keynote speakers so join us in Boston!

This cause means so much to me because families navigating PANS/PANDAS need more than answers. They need community, support, visibility, and hope.

There are a few meaningful ways you can help:

Join Team OHM and walk with us in Boston

Participate virtually from wherever you are

Make a donation of any amount

Become a sponsor

Share this post to help spread awareness

Every step and every donation helps bring more attention, resources, and support to families who should not have to walk this road alone.

I would be so grateful to have you join us.

Learn more, donate, or join Team OHM through the link in my bio.

08/13/2026

One of the things COVID helped reveal is how much infections can affect the vascular system.

Dr. Casey Kelley describes how Lyme, Babesia, and other tick-borne infections can contribute to vascular inflammation, hypercoagulation, and changes in the way blood moves through the body.

And when COVID is added to an already inflamed or infection-burdened system, the terrain can change even more.

This matters in PANS/PANDAS because the brain does not exist separately from the rest of the body.

Circulation, inflammation, immune activation, oxygen delivery, gut health, detoxification, and nervous system regulation are all part of the larger picture.

That is why a whole-child approach matters so much.

Not every child will have the same root cause. Not every symptom points to the same infection. But when a child remains stuck in chronic, relapsing neuropsychiatric symptoms, we have to be willing to look more broadly.

This is from Episode #63 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS: “The Tick-Borne Infections Hiding Behind Your Child’s PANS/PANDAS.”

I hope you’ll listen to the full conversation for a thoughtful, grounded discussion on tick-borne illness, testing, treatment, and why this work truly takes a village.

08/12/2026

Today’s episode is live, and we are talking about a piece of PANS/PANDAS that deserves much more attention: The role of tick-borne and vector-borne infections in ongoing inflammation.

Dr. Casey Kelley and I discuss how chronic infections can affect the endothelial system — the lining of the blood vessels — and why that matters for immune function, inflammation, hormones, circulation, and the brain.

This conversation also touches on how COVID changed the terrain for many patients, especially when layered on top of infections like Lyme, Bartonella, Babesia, or other chronic inflammatory burdens.

In the full episode, we talk about:

- Why not remembering a tick bite does not rule out infection

- How Bartonella and Babesia can show up in children with PANS/PANDAS

- Why testing can be imperfect

- Why detox pathways and gut protection matter before treatment

And why healing has to happen in kid-sized steps, not rushed protocols

Episode #63 of Demystifying PANS/PANDAS is available now: “The Tick-Borne Infections Hiding Behind Your Child’s PANS/PANDAS.”

If your family or patients are stuck in cycles of rage, anxiety, inflammation, or relapsing symptoms, I hope this conversation helps you ask new questions.

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