Our Burlingame Providers

 
 

Alex Zha, MD

Hello there! Thanks for taking the time to learn more about us here at Bay Children’s Services. I am a second-generation Chinese American who grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. After college, I moved to Ohio to attend medical school at The Ohio State University (Go Bucks!) followed by adult psychiatry residency at the Cleveland Clinic. I returned to the Bay Area to complete my training at Stanford and to pursue my dream of working with children and adolescents and their families.

My passion is helping individuals reach their full potential and flourish. Every person walks in the door with a unique story and set of connections to family, friends, and the world. I will listen and work with you to build a mutual understanding and develop a collaborative plan on how to move forward through life. I chose to work at Bay Children’s Services because of our mutual vision of high quality, patient-centered care. I am honored to be serving the community that means a great deal to me.

Clinical areas of focus include attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, autism, anxiety, mood, obsessive compulsive disorder, substance use, and trauma. When I’m not in the office, you can find me in the outdoors, gardening, cooking, and spending time with loved ones.

Sasha Narayan, MD

Originally raised in Burlingame, California, I'm thrilled to return home to practice Child, Adolescent, Reproductive, and Adult Psychiatry after completing my medical training. I obtained my medical degree in 2020 and completed a surgical internship in 2021 at Oregon Health and Science University in Portland, Oregon. Thereafter, I moved to Baltimore, Maryland to complete an Adult Psychiatry residency specializing in perinatal psychiatry in 2024, followed by a Child and Adolescent Psychiatry fellowship at Johns Hopkins Hospital in 2026.

I am passionate about maternal-infant and young-child attachment, especially for parents who themselves struggle with mood, anxiety, or executive function disorders, such as depression, bipolar disorder, OCD, anxiety, and ADHD. I particularly enjoy collaborating with people to reunite the mind-body connection especially through the lens of significant hormonal fluctuations like feminizing hormonal/surgical therapies, puberty, matrescence, pregnancy, birth, and the post-partum period. A main focus of my perinatal practice is helping parents cope with the changes of matrescence and the realities of that first year after birth to address issues such as sibling integration, feeding, and return-to-work. I enjoy helping families navigate the challenging reality that the “village” has disappeared from our current society and is being replaced by technology, social media, and AI, which can make balancing childrearing feel harder than ever.

My typical practice combines thoughtful medication management with lifestyle adjustments, education, and therapeutic techniques derived from a deep understanding of my patient to arrive at a plan that feels manageable and realistic for each person’s unique situation. When treating young children, my emphasis frequently highlights supporting parents to learn how to structure their parenting to improve their relationship with their children, particularly when anxiety and neurodivergence (like ADHD and ASD) complicate the emotional experience of day-to-day life. I take a collaborative, friendly, down-to-earth approach to help my patients reach their goals and improve their quality of life.

When not working, I enjoy spending time with my husband and kids and love traveling, hiking, gardening, and doing yoga.

Jinit Desai, MD

I am a bilingual (English, Spanish) psychiatrist and psychotherapist. After medical school in Illinois, I completed adult psychiatry residency at the UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, then community child and adolescent psychiatry fellowship at Stanford. I am completing a two-year psychoanalytic psychotherapy fellowship through the San Francisco Center for Psychoanalysis. I offer integrated care grounded in curiosity and acceptance to individuals and families, bringing together pharmacotherapeutic, psychotherapeutic, and structural interventions. I offer in-person and telehealth services. I feel honored and grateful to do what I do, and I look forward to meeting you.