Curricular Goals:
- Skill development in diagnosing and treating psychiatric illnesses within the scope of Family Medicine
- Skill development in approaches to communication, counseling, and education in an outpatient primary care setting
- Enhanced understanding of the resident's own doctor-patient relationships
- Role development as a family physician with an emphasis on self care and burnout prevention
Teaching Arenas:
Noon Conference Series: Monthly presentation of topics in psychiatry through 18 core lecture topics.
Monthly Workshops: Led by Behavioral Science faculty, workshops enhance basic psychiatric/medical training using clinical case discussions, role-playing, videos, and guest speakers. They are practical and interactive. Topics include the following:
- Crisis intervention, grief reaction, death and dying
- Domestic violence: intimate partner and teen dating abuse
- Families of origin
- Family roles in primary care and chronic illness
- Human sexuality
- Interviewing skills and counseling
- Motivational interviewing
- Psychosocial aspects of substance abuse
- Transitioning from residency, terminating with patients
Psychiatric Consultation: Our Director of Behavioral Sciences is available to residents in the outpatient clinic two half days per week for formal and informal consultation. Residents may also schedule their patients with psychiatric comorbidities to be seen together with the psychiatrist in the Family Health Center Psychiatric Consultation Clinic twice a month.
Resident Support Groups: Monthly and PGY-specific support group with facilitator. Mandatory (during protected time) for the PGY-I class, with option to continue throughout training.
Balint Group: Monthly Balint-modeled discussion group designed to process doctor-patient relationships with difficult patients.
Pain Clinic: Multidisciplinary assessment of patients with chronic pain within the Family Health Center. The emphasis is to evaluate patients who have been on long-term opioid therapy. Disciplines include psychiatric, social, and medical evaluation and treatment recommendations.
Counseling/Community Assessment and Referral Consultation: Provided by our licensed clinical social worker.
Home Visits: Residents are accompanied by our social worker to selected patients' homes for more detailed understanding of a patient's chronic illness as it relates to his or her psychosocial milieu.