Gisela Maia has held a degree in neurophysiology from the Polytechnic Institute of North – Healthcare School since 2006. In 2007, she founded her own clinical centre, focused mainly on neurology and psychiatry. Since then, Gisela Maia has dedicated herself to performing electroencephalograms in clinical, hospital, and research contexts, focusing on signal source analysis and quantitative EEG in psychiatric disorders, mainly in patients with depression. In 2008, she began her PhD in neuroscience at the Faculty of Medicine, University of Porto, focusing her research on basic cellular and neurochemical mechanisms associated with temporal lobe epilepsy and depression, recording EEG signals in cortical and deep cerebral areas in the rat brain. In 2015, she began teaching at the Polytechnic Institute of Porto, mainly neuroanatomy, electroencephalography, and evoked potentials for undergraduate and MSc programmes.
As a researcher, Gisela Maia has published several scientific articles in conferences, book chapters, and journals. She actively collaborates with the clinical and scientific community, integrating a mental health programme at Neuroscience Hospital – Trofa Saúde, Portugal, whose goal is to study EEG biomarkers in patients with depression, especially those considered resistant to treatment. In line with this, she is an advisor and co-advisor to several MSc and PhD students. In 2024, she was awarded an MBA in Health Management from the University Fernando Pessoa, Porto. She is now focusing on a value-based healthcare approach to managing clinical decisions in patients with depression, working together with physicians and engineers.