Dr O'Doherty is a Chartered Clinical Psychologist of 26 years experience. She has  extensive experience in assessing, treating and researching a full range of psychological problems.

She has expertise in analysing and treating the causes and consequences of depression, anxiety disorders,  post-traumatic stress disorder, panic disorder, phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder, behavioural disorders in children and personality disorder. She also has  experience of pain disorder.

She has undergraduate and postgraduate degrees in psychology from University College Dublin (BA 1978, MA 1979),she obtained  qualification in clinical psychology from the University of Edinburgh in 1982 and a PhD in the psychology of stressful life events from the University of Strathclyde in 1988. She has  a graduate diploma in eLearning from the National College of Ireland (2003).

She is an  Associate Fellow of the British Psychological Society and a Chartered Clinical Psychologist and a member of the Psychological Society of Ireland. She has been a Research Fellow in the Department of Business Studies at the University of Edinburgh (1990-1992), and a Senior Research Fellow in the Department of Psychology at Strathclyde University (1984-1989). She has also worked as a Clinical Psychologist, and as a Senior Clinical Psychologist with the North Eastern and North Western Health Boards in Ireland (1979-1984).