Laura Napora, MSW, LCSW
Staff, Lexington (Duval Street)

Laura Napora is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker with experience working with all ages. Laura has a Bachelor’s degree from Michigan State University and Master’s Degree in Social Work from the University of Hawaii in 1992. 

Laura worked in military settings during a 5 year stay in Hawaii and began work with intensive children’s programs on arrival to Kentucky many years ago. Her work with children and families included in-home and case management and later outpatient and collaborative school & office-based therapy including crisis management. Laura has worked in jail settings doing assessments across Central/East KY. She has worked for many years in community mental health settings working with all ages individually and with strengthening families.  She has worked with severe mental illness, co-occurring diagnoses and homelessness, forming a rich understanding of human functioning. 

Laura draws from cognitive behavioral and family structural and systems therapies often as well as person-centered, solution-focused and reality therapy. Laura has worked with Depression, Bipolar Disorder, PTSD, Adjustment Disorders, Anxiety, Panic Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, Schizoaffective, Psychoses, Dual Diagnoses, Substance Abuse, and other disorders and can work closely with prescribers if needed. She can also work on Relationship Skills, Parenting Skills, Character Development, Life Transitions, and Grief/Loss. If you have a Faith tradition that gives you strength, we will also include this in formulating the treatment plan, if you wish.

Laura views therapy as a personalized, collaborative effort.  The goal of treatment is to define problems and then work in small, as well as “big picture” ways to gain skills and mastery over the issues and deficits that restrain one’s individual functioning, relationships, family life, and life in our communities. Laura is compassionate and can be direct as well. Therapy with Laura is both practical and theoretical in nature, and when done together well, it is a process toward hope, improvement, and joy.