When APsaA Fellowship Program chair Elise Snyder asked me to fly down to San Francisco for the January meeting of the American Association of Directors of Psychiatric Residency Training (AADPRT), I was not sure what to expect. I imagined my role to be promotion of the Fellowship to residency directors and any residents who might be in attendance. I was partly correct, but the specifics of the agenda were in the hands of Fellowship Subcommittee member Charles Fisher.
In San Francisco, I indeed had the opportunity to promote the Fellowship, to new training directors and to the those attending the AADPRT residents' caucus. However, informal meetings with Dr. Fisher (himself a residency training director) and AADPRT executive secretary David Goldberg opened up a larger agenda, one offering APsaA Fellows and former Fellows a role in ensuring and enhancing the presence of psychodynamic training in the curricula of psychiatric residencies.
AADPRT is seeking to identify those basic skills in psychodynamic assessment, formulation, and psychotherapy with which all psychiatric residents should be conversant. APsaA Fellows and former Fellows, from their current and past residency experiences, can offer valuable suggestions on how psychodynamic training can be improved and integrated with training in neurobiology and psychopharmacology. Fellows and former Fellows frequently have the opportunity to work with public-sector patients, and may have used psychodynamic formulations and treatment approaches with beneficial effect in their work with this population. Dr. Fisher and I are beginning to explore possible linkages between APsaA Fellows / former Fellows and AADPRT committees or individual members. A resident-designed workshop devoted to the application of psychodynamic concepts in work with public-sector patients may be included on the program of AADPRT's Midwinter Meeting next January. Interested Fellows and former Fellows will be asked to help in developing the presentation. If the workshop is successful, we hope to repeat it at the American Psychiatric Association's annual meeting later that year.
In the AADPRT residents' caucus, my presence as a former APsaA Fellow helped focus the discussion on the value of psychodynamic training. About thirty residents participated in a lively interchange on the topic, in the process comparing notes on various residency programs. The result was that Michael McClure, head of the caucus and a resident at Eisenhower Army Medical Center in Georgia, reported to the Executive Council of AADPRT that residents consider psychodynamic training a vital part of their education as psychiatrists.
Over the next months I will be working with APsaA Fellows and former Fellows, with members of the AADPRT residents' caucus, and with Drs. Fisher and Goldberg to explore these avenues for influencing psychiatric residency curricula. Dr. Goldberg has suggested that residents join AADPRT in developing Internet connections to enhance communication regarding training issues.
Sandra Clement Walker, M.D., a former APsaA Fellow, is a PGY3 at the University of Washington.