Path to Psychiatry

[PsychNstein]

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Hello All! I am looking for some much needed direction. I am a non-traditional student; 37 yrs old, have a master's degree in Social Work, and am currently working on my LCSW hours. I've always wanted to be a Psychiatrist but kids came first and I went in the therapist direction so I could have that time with them. I always regretted not pursuing it, but have really enjoyed seeing my kids grow up. I've always felt that I should have stuck with my goal, and I am now getting my prerequisites so I can do just that.
I love working with children and adolescents, so that will be my specialty. I've worked in mental health for the past 10 years, and am currently working as a medical social worker at the local hospital and our county mental health performing 5150 evals at the hospital. I have a unique ability to reach unreacheable children, and understand them. I also work well with parents and family members, as well as the doctors I work with.

I would like to know the ins-and-outs of the best programs for child and adolescent psychiatry.
1)Are there any programs that will recognize the work I have already completed in the field?
2)How long are residencies and fellowships? And do they differ by program or are they board enforced time frames?
3)Are there opportunities for tuition reimbursement or scholarships?
4)What are the best programs for my specialty?

Any helpful information will be appreciated! Thanks!

 

[erg923]

I think its important to worry about medical school first. Your expereince will be somwhat beneficial, but wont come into play until applying for residency at the end of med school. Even then a biggest factors will be your board scores, letter of recs, and your competence as a physician. The social work stuff will be more beneficial to you personally as you learn how to interact with psychiatric patients during residencey.

 

[PsychNstein]

Yes, I need to worry about medical school acceptance but it's also important to know where I am heading and how to get there. At this point getting in does not seem as much of a problem as where to get into.

 

[erg923]

I am not sure of the percentage of people that stay on for residency at the place which they attended med school. Certainly possible, but its much more common to move of course.

AGME Accredits childs psych programs by the way, so you might wanna do a search http://www.acgme.org/adspublic/

PS: Adult psych residency is 4 years...one year is med..the other 3 are psych. Child and Adolscent tends to be 5 years I think.

 

[PsychNstein]

Thanks for the info. I'll check out the link and see where it leads me!

 

[worriedwell]

Its hard to tell you about the best programs in Child and Adolscent Psychiatry because you are about 7-8 years at minimum away from being in a fellowship in that area and 99% of what you will be doing up until then (regardless of past experience) will have nothing to do with your area of interest (and that includes adult residency, which while giving the basics of psychopharm and diagnosis, will have very little child exposure in most programs.

The quality of Child programs will without a doubt change to some degree as well between now and then. Some programs have the infrastructure to stay excellent (like Yale and NYU) but leadership can change.

All medical school is 4 years minimum, all adult residency is 3 years minimum (usually 4) but with the option of skipping year four to do your 2 year Child fellowship for a minimum of 5 total training years in residency and fellowship.

I know of no residency that provides tuition reimbursement but after residency there are programs where if you provide a few years of service, they reimburse your tuition (rural areas or military are two examples).

Medical school scholarships do exist of course, but are entirely variable based on the school.

You have boatloads of experience in social work so you won't have to oversell that aspect of your experience (it speaks for itself), but what medical schools and residencies will care most about for you is your ability and interest in working in hard science (biological systems)...so make sure that is your primary area of focus. If you excel in medical school, you should be a shoe-in for a great residency.

 

[babel]

Yes, I need to worry about medical school acceptance but it's also important to know where I am heading and how to get there. At this point getting in does not seem as much of a problem as where to get into.

I'd just like to echo some of the other posters and say that in fact you DO need to worry first and foremost about the whole "medical school" thing, for sooo many reasons!!
1) Are you interested in medicine, apart from psychiatry? I think it's fine, great even, going in knowing what field you're in interested in, but you will absolutely need a basic interest in general medicine to get through 4 years of medical school, of which only ~2-4mo tops will be spent on Psychiatry, in addition to 6 months of your intern year which will be spent on Medicine/Peds/Neuro.

2) Getting in IS a problem..... not to encourage you to be as freaked out as all the other premeds, but there is a lot that goes into it.

3) Have you thought about the economics of it? I absolutely would NOT count on any scholarships to get you out of any debt. Those things do exist, but they are not something you can bank on at this stage in the game. Hopefully you live somewhere with cheap state schools (i.e. Texas, and not CA!) If you are just now starting to work on your prereqs, do you realize you may be close to 50yo before you start practicing, and potentially with $200-$300k hanging over your head? Perhaps for whatever reason that doesn't sound like such a problem to you, but it would seem like a good idea to check out the non-trad forum (I'm sure there's one around somewhere) and seeing what people have to say there, both positive and negative.

In any case, just make sure you really think it all through.........best of luck!