Psychiatry vs. Psychology in Practice

[AlexMack12]

Hello everyone!
I know the 'psychiatry vs. psychology' question has been broached in other threads, and I've read through some of these threads before asking my questions. However, I still have a few questions that haven't been touched upon.

At this time, I am making a decision between going to medical school to become a psychiatrist or getting my PhD and becoming a psychologist. As this is a forum for psychiatrists, of course I am not seeking/expecting a perspective on psychologists but I would like to ask for a bit of feedback from psychiatrists' perspectives.

I understand the basic differences between a psychiatrist vs a psychologist- such as how their training length and costs differ, differences in being a successful program applicant (MCAT vs GRE, etc), and eventual probable differences in salary.

I'm really more interested in knowing about job satisfaction/rewards, etc.

I'm a staunch believer in actual psychotherapy. When I practice and take care of clients (patients), I don't want to just write a prescription and move on to the next patient. I want to actually conduct psychotherapy sessions. That being said, I firmly believe that while many psychiatric disorders can benefit from psychotherapy (although, of course, not all), psychotherapy can be very ineffective even among those disorders it has proven to be effective in treating without adjunct medication. I believe that many disorders are the product of BOTH environment AND biological/physiological/chemical deficits, processes gone awry, etc.

This is what makes it difficult for me to choose which field to go into. Ultimately, I'm curious as to whether real practicing psychiatrists (vs. what is hypothetically done in practice) do have an opportunity to conduct psychotherapy. Are therapy techniques emphasized at any point in training (especially residency)? Or is the role of the psychiatrist really medication management? I'd like to actually help someone work through a crisis, or conduct CBT, but I'd also like the flexibility of being able to prescribe medications (when necessary, to facilitate the effectiveness of therapy) and monitor medication effectiveness, side effects, etc.

I understand things like loan repayments and whatnot can affect job satisfaction and happiness, but if it is at all possible (and I don't know if it is, as I have not yet been in your shoes) to remove something like that from consideration for a moment, do you find psychiatry rewarding overall? Do you feel like you are making a difference in at least some patients' lives?

For those who knew they wanted to be psychiatrists before attending medical school (of course I understand the importance of entering with an open mind, but some people have a small feeling from the get-go that psychiatry is the 'right' field for them, and then this is reinforced by 3rd/4th year), are you glad you went the med school route and became a psychiatrist? Do you ever feel like you would have the same (or more?) satisfaction or a more rewarding career if you became a psychologist?

Thank you for all who take the time to read this. I know everyone has different experiences and whatnot, but absolutely any feedback at all would be greatly appreciated.

---

Members don't see this ad.

 

[OldPsychDoc]

...This is what makes it difficult for me to choose which field to go into. Ultimately, I'm curious as to whether real practicing psychiatrists (vs. what is hypothetically done in practice) do have an opportunity to conduct psychotherapy. Are therapy techniques emphasized at any point in training (especially residency)? ....

Yes

... I'd like to actually help someone work through a crisis, or conduct CBT, but I'd also like the flexibility of being able to prescribe medications (when necessary, to facilitate the effectiveness of therapy) and monitor medication effectiveness, side effects, etc.
....

Then you want to go to medical school and become a psychiatrist. (And yes it's quite rewarding and I would not have done otherwise.)

 

[IAmAUser]

.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

I'm one of those people who entered medical school with the thought of psychiatry as a potential career, which meant I also did some thinking about the ph.d. route, and I've got to say I'm glad I picked my current path. Yes, psychotherapy is emphasized in our training, and lots of psychiatrists do primarily psychotherapy focused work. There's a lot of individual (and program) variation, but you can certainly get plenty of psychotherapy exposure in your training as a psychiatrist. I would prefer not to do a medication management style practice, either, but I like being able to prescribe medications because they do have benefits. I also like actually training as a physician and having some basic understanding of how physical processes can affect a person's mental health.

Also, I'm going to disagree with the poster above because I don't think medical school or residency are the worst things ever. While medical school wasn't the best time of my life ever, it wasn't all that bad, really. You study a lot, you get treated like crap occasionally, but that stuff can happen in lots of situations. I doubt the ph.d. route is that much easier. Residency certainly has its ups and downs, but overall, it's not as painful as we (OK maybe me in lots of previous threads) make it out to be.

 

[digitlnoize]

Also, I'm going to disagree with the poster above because I don't think medical school or residency are the worst things ever. While medical school wasn't the best time of my life ever, it wasn't all that bad, really.

I actually loved medical school. It was hard work, but isn't everything that's worth doing? It wasn't nearly as hard as I expected it to be, and I even found some time to have something resembling a life. Granted, I wasn't an uber-gunner, so that helped, but I did just fine.

I met some of the most amazing friends I've ever had, we had loads of fun, I got to live in an amazing city, study on an amazing beach pretty much weekly, and even managed to spend time with my wife and daughter.

 

[heyjack70]

Hello everyone!
I know the 'psychiatry vs. psychology' question has been broached in other threads, and I've read through some of these threads before asking my questions. However, I still have a few questions that haven't been touched upon.

I think the definitive question is which would walk out of the octagon triumphant? The answer: Psychiatrists.


I may be biased.

 

[TexasPhysician]

If therapy is your passion, go phd. In some states (NM, etc.), you can even prescribe meds now.

 

[AcronymAllergy]

To weigh in from the "other side:" much like the posters above have mentioned that in order to be a psychiatrist, you need a strong interest in medicine so as to successfully navigate med school, I'll say that in order to successfully navigate most reputable training programs in psychology, you're going to need to be interested enough in research to have it be a significant portion of your training. Mind you, it's true that the majority of clinical psychology graduates don't go own to practice as full-time researchers. However, many practitioners still make contributions to the literature, and all should be informing their practice via the critical consumption of literature as well as the use of scientific principles in their practice (particularly when it comes to psychological testing).

If you're truly set on the prescribing aspect, then go with psychiatry. As an added bonus (although others here with much more knowledge on the subject can of course correct me), psychiatry seems to have a fairly robust amount of job security, and the pay differential can at times be quite significant. Now don't get me wrong, you can definitely make a respectable living as a psychologist, and if you attended reputable training programs and have adequately beefed up your CV, odds are you're not going to be out on the street, but the clear-cut path to a six-figure income is a much surer thing via psychiatry (although with Ph.D.'s being fully-funded most of the time, your graduating debt load as a psychologist is often times lower).

 

[Chimed]

If your goal is really to do therapy, then I'd seriously consider the PhD program over medical school as recommended in some of the above posts. During undergrad, I also went through a process of deciding to go for a PhD or go to medical school. In the end, what drove me to medical school was that I could potentially see myself doing other things then psychiatry such as neurology or family medicine (and, yes, even surgery). I decided that I wanted a more medical background and wanted to be an expert in pharmacology, in addition to doing therapy. I also enjoyed studying basic science and physiology and knew that I'd enjoy learning about general medicine. If I didn't enjoy learning medicine and couldn't have seen myself as potentially doing something other then therapy, I would have been absolutely miserable during medical school. If you don't think you'd find learning about general medicine for hours on in for 4 years, then I'd seriously think twice about medical school.

In addition, I knew that if I went into psychiatry I could still do as much or as little therapy as I wanted. For myself, medical school just gave me much more options. The down side is that, it will take longer to get into the more psychotherapeutic techniques and your PhD trainee colleagues will be more competent in therapy then you will in a shorter amount of time. There is just no way around the fact that a PhD psychologist is going to be, in general, far more competent in therapy unless the resident/psychiatrists is highly motivated to get additional training.

If you go the MD route, YOU CAN BECOME AN EXPERT IN THERAPY. But you'll have to be prepared to do more work and be far more proactive about your training. For example, the people from my program that have gone on to become psychotherapists did additional training at a local psychoanalytic institute and continue to get training even after graduating. I know of at least 4 people from recent graduates that have a primarily psychotherapy practice, and are doing well.

On a personal note, it turns out that I'm extremely glad I did not go with a PhD. While I'm very happy with my therapy training, I found that I really don't like it as much as I thought and really enjoy my role as the psychiatrist who works with therapists. With that said, I do like doing ERP for OCD and CBT for anxiety disorders and am in the process of getting additional therapy training. But I plan on only doing a few hours a week of pure therapy. My point is, make sure you know you'll enjoy being a therapist before committing to a PhD program because you'll be more limited in your options if you find you don't like it.

 

[Chimed]

If therapy is your passion, go phd. In some states (NM, etc.), you can even prescribe meds now.

 

[dl2dp2]

The down side is that, it will take longer to get into the more psychotherapeutic techniques and your PhD trainee colleagues will be more competent in therapy then you will in a shorter amount of time. There is just no way around the fact that a PhD psychologist is going to be, in general, far more competent in therapy unless the resident/psychiatrists is highly motivated to get additional training.

I don't agree with that. I think per ACGME requirement, any psychiatrist would be equally competent in the modality of therapy that's uniformly stipulated to be part of the training (i.e. psychodynamic, CBT, combined psychopharm & therapy). If you want additional modalities and don't get the training, of course you won't be able to do it, but the evidence out there is that there is no modality specific superiority in terms of efficacy.

I would say a better way to say what you are saying is that while psychiatrists can do therapy, psychology training has a wider latitude in terms of different modalities. Psychodynamic therapy is usually less emphasized in psychology training.

This topic has been discussed extensively in the past. I think as time goes on psychiatry will become more and more medicine-like, but certain subspecialty therapy domains may be not as easily accessible to psychology. For instance, for unclear reasons, wealthy clients who self-pay for long term psychoanalytically trained therapists prefer MDs from top programs.

 

[OldPsychDoc]

I think the definitive question is which would walk out of the octagon triumphant? The answer: Psychiatrists.


I may be biased.

Well of course. Once we've jabbed them with our B52, it's Game Over.


BTW Folks--please refrain from turning this into a psych vs psych thread.

 

[IAmAUser]

.

 

[notdeadyet]

I agree with many of the others: if therapy is your overwhelming goal and interest, go the psychology route.

Unless you are interested in being a physician who happens to specialize in mental illness, it just doesn't strike me as the appropriate path. You spend a lot of time learning to think, diagnose, work-up, research and treat according to the medical model. Depending on your practice, a big portion of the treat part may be psychotherapy, but if the physician mindset and training doesn't appeal to you, it's a lot of years wasted.

 

[BobA]

Have you worked with the severely mentally ill?

You might want to get some work experience interacting with this population before deciding to become a psychiatrist.

 

[whopper]

I too am a believer of psychotherapy.

But a problem is that several psychiatrists are dropping their strengths in this role. Further, if you're in an area, you could likely be the only psychiatrist available. If you start giving patients extended psychotherapy sessions, you're cutting yourself from several who will need you.

I'm personally sometimes offended by the psychiatrists who blow off the psychotherapy aspects of mental health treatment but I've chosen to refer patients in need of in-depth treatment to other providers so I could see more patients while I was in private practice because I believe I was able to do more good as a whole.

My own personal opinion is psychotherapy needs to be emphasized more in training, but I don't fault any psychiatrist wanting to limit their role in this manner so they can get to more patients so long as they make sure the psychotherapy aspects are being utilized by others.

 

[nitemagi]

As a younger psychiatrist in private practice part-time, I love doing therapy. I have a small practice and it's slowly growing. Even in a big city like LA, in a completely saturated area (West LA) with mental health providers, there are not that many psychiatrists that do psychotherapy and do it really well. When I'm networking and introducing myself to older psychiatrists and other therapists, I hear over and over and over again "Oh my God, you do X and Y and Z? And you're male? You're going to have SO MUCH work." Still waiting for that to happen, but my practice is only 8 mos old and I don't put as much time into building it as I should.

I do a lot of therapy in my PP.

As has been mentioned, though, I am not the norm, and many salaried jobs will not want you doing therapy (though most are open to it if you ask ahead of time). Even rarer is to have expertise in more than 1 psychotherapy.

I believe in raising the bar, and I don't believe training ends when residency ends (I'm finishing my first year in analytic training, I go to regular hypnosis training workshops, I've gone to the Beck Institute for workshops). If you aim just to be a good therapist and do nothing else, you could get by with a masters degree. That will limit who you can treat and what you can do. As a psychiatrist with good training in psychopharm, good training in residency in therapy, and ongoing training in therapy, there are few I couldn't offer something in treatment.

Being a psychiatrist is a longer more expensive road, but it gives you more options for the rest of your life.

 

[Chimed]

I too am a believer of psychotherapy.

But a problem is that several psychiatrists are dropping their strengths in this role. Further, if you're in an area, you could likely be the only psychiatrist available. If you start giving patients extended psychotherapy sessions, you're cutting yourself from several who will need you.

I'm personally sometimes offended by the psychiatrists who blow off the psychotherapy aspects of mental health treatment but I've chosen to refer patients in need of in-depth treatment to other providers so I could see more patients while I was in private practice because I believe I was able to do more good as a whole.

My own personal opinion is psychotherapy needs to be emphasized more in training, but I don't fault any psychiatrist wanting to limit their role in this manner so they can get to more patients so long as they make sure the psychotherapy aspects are being utilized by others.

This might be getting a little off topic, but to your points above and to keep with the question of the OP...There is a difference in definitions and meaning when someone speak of "doing therapy" and "doing medication management." When I tell someone I don't do that much therapy, what I mean is that I don't plan on having that many dedicated 50 min sessions to work with psychodynamic or even full CBT sessions on a regular basis (I do plan of a few hours a week). However, I'm ALWAYS doing therapy during my medication sessions, which often extends to 50 minute RV visits. That is something that is often not talked about--that medication RVs can be psychologically therapeutic through a good doctor-patient relationship.

Being in psychiatry I see myself as being that person who looks at the entire picture for my patients and the one who makes sure their total mental health is looked at. During my med checks I also go through proper sleep hygiene, talk about exercise, proper diet, stress reduction techniques, and use a lot of supportive and cognitive restructuring techniques when my patients are talking about a difficult week. Working with kids, I often spend time with the parents on behavioral management and parenting issues. IMO, that is just good doctoring and not necessarily doing therapy.

I think it is unfortunate that we sometimes give the impression that you either do therapy or prescribe medication, as if the two are completely separate skills that you have to isolate. But when someone says, however, that they just want to be a therapist, then they should really question their decision to go to medical school. Being a psychiatrist is so much more, but is a long road if you're not willing to do the extra work to integrate everything.

 

[Therapist4Chnge]

I believe in raising the bar, and I don't believe training ends when residency ends (I'm finishing my first year in analytic training, I go to regular hypnosis training workshops, I've gone to the Beck Institute for workshops).

I applaud you for seeking additional training, I wish more clinicians (psychiatrists and others) did this. So many clinicians are under-prepared in the arena, but that doesn't stop them from doing it anyway.

As for picking between -iatry & -ology...OP, if you want to prescribe, do -iatry because that will give you the best opportunities (as opposed to Ph.D. + NP, etc). If you just want to do therapy....probably an MS is your best "bang for the buck". I'd strongly recommend pursuing additional training afterwards because students coming from most/all programs would benefit from additional training. -ology has a lot more training in stats, research, psychometrics, etc. It is a long road if you don't really like those areas. I think the training makes you a superior therapist as compared to other roads, but it is a much harder sell to most folks because of the time and additional training req.

Outside of a handful of saturated markets....we can definitely use more psychiatrists who can do both...and do them well.

 

[roubs]

I'd echo the other psychology posters above, a Ph.D. program is much more than therapy training. Think about

Intellectual/personality assessment and report writing
Stats
Original research design
How many days of a perfectly good summer you want to spend making a database look pretty?
Do you like to write? A lot? More than that? How about endless editing?

I guess you could avoid some of these researchy things by going to a Psy.D. school, but that's a whole different comparison thread.

 

[whopper]

A psychology Ph.D is impressive and you'll have more of a life during your training. If you go the psychiatry route, you'll barely touch mental health for years while working crazy hours for nothing or next to nothing.

I'd only recommend someone go into psychiatry over another mental health field if they had a characteristic that really and truly would make them happier in this field vs. another because the training is so difficult (and no productively so), debt-incurring, and you dont' do much mental health training until actual residency.

I see my time in medical school as almost "lost" in terms of living like a human being. I was living in fear all the time, studying ridiculous hours, and couldn't understand half the professors, some who openly stated they didn't give a damn about us and they were only teaching because they had to do so, and their real interest was research. That only prompted me to have to study even harder because I wasn't learning anything from the guy's actual lecture.

 

[AcronymAllergy]

A psychology Ph.D is impressive and you'll have more of a life during your training. If you go the psychiatry route, you'll barely touch mental health for years while working crazy hours for nothing or next to nothing.

I'd only recommend someone go into psychiatry over another mental health field if they had a characteristic that really and truly would make them happier in this field vs. another because the training is so difficult (and no productively so), debt-incurring, and you dont' do much mental health training until actual residency.

I see my time in medical school as almost "lost" in terms of living like a human being. I was living in fear all the time, studying ridiculous hours, and couldn't understand half the professors, some who openly stated they didn't give a damn about us and they were only teaching because they had to do so, and their real interest was research. That only prompted me to have to study even harder because I wasn't learning anything from the guy's actual lecture.

It's always, always a shame when this is the case. It happens in graduate programs as well, although it seems as though there is generally less of an emphasis on formal coursework in grad school than med school, so it might not screw with our heads/frustrate us to quite the same degree.

 

[Chimed]

A psychology Ph.D is impressive and you'll have more of a life during your training. If you go the psychiatry route, you'll barely touch mental health for years while working crazy hours for nothing or next to nothing.

I'd only recommend someone go into psychiatry over another mental health field if they had a characteristic that really and truly would make them happier in this field vs. another because the training is so difficult (and no productively so), debt-incurring, and you dont' do much mental health training until actual residency.

I see my time in medical school as almost "lost" in terms of living like a human being. I was living in fear all the time, studying ridiculous hours, and couldn't understand half the professors, some who openly stated they didn't give a damn about us and they were only teaching because they had to do so, and their real interest was research. That only prompted me to have to study even harder because I wasn't learning anything from the guy's actual lecture.

whopper, based on reading your posts through the years, it seems like you had an especially difficult medical school and residency training experience. That sucks.

For myself, medical school was challenging and I also spent many hours study while accumulating a high amount of debt. With that said, other then a few rare exceptions, the instructors/attendings at the medical school I attended did care about our education and we were treated with respect. The one attending (a surgeon, of course) that was nasty with medical students was banned from teaching once someone complained. Also, my medical school had a lot of emphasis on humanism and doctor patient relationships. I also developed some very close friendships that I'm still in close contact with, not to mention I meet my wife and got married during that time. So, I don't think the environment in every medical school is as bad as whopper's experience. But I do agree that it is a very challenging road, and something that should be carefully thought about before going down. As I said above, I did a lot of soul searching when deciding to go to medical school over a PhD. For myself, I know I made the right decision and I would do it again if given the choice. Overall, I love what I do and think psychiatry is a great field to be in. But medical school can be grueling and it's not for everyone.

 

[sunlioness]

Yeah, I actually liked medical school. But I was in a fairly supportive place where the professors liked teaching and wanted us to understand and do well. I don't think I would have liked it at all had my experience been like Whopper's.

 

[whopper]

I think I had the following problems happen to me:

Me: I'm a Meyers Briggs ENTJ. That personality type hates medschool and won't do well on multiple choice tests even when we know the stuff well.

On my USMLEs, I barely passed each one. On USMLE 3, I scored in the top 1% in the computer simulation portion but did poorly on the multiple choice section. Given that both are supposed to measure one's medical knowledge (while the simulation is more tilted toward procedural knowledge and on the spot thinking), the big disparity in scores shows the Meyers Briggs theory holds up well there.

Outside of me: Another problem was I went to Rutgers U. for undergrad, a school where the overwhelming majority is premed. I'm talking several thousand students and the state med schools will only take up about 200 a year. The school openly weeds out students instead of fostering a culture of learning and encouragement. The premed office was usually cold and discouraging to premeds.

The biggest shame of that is you're put into a program where the University politics put research professors who don't want to teach into the 101 courses and it really kills the desire to learn. A buddy of mine was a bio major because he actually wanted to be a real biologist but being in that weed-out culture, he came to hate it. He had no intention of being a medical doctor but had to take the same classes where everyone was being weeded out.

The typical culture was to have a lecture, the profs were hardly at their office hours, you get exams, the exams were often times not indicative of what was in the book or in the class, the argument was the score was based off of a curve so "it has to be fair. There's a group that's above, in the middle and below." I figured this out my 4th year. To do well, each class had a trick and the trick was not based on actually learning the stuff. It had to do with things like getting every single old exam in the class and memorizing each question and answer because if you actually read the material, you wouldn't see it on the exam. The only way to get the old exams was to have a good social network because they weren't available from the class or bookstores.

I went to Syracuse U for a 2 years before I transferred to Rutgers, and I didn't decide to go premed till transferred but did take some premed courses at SU. There the courses were taught for real. My GPA was about a 3.8 when I left SU, dropped to about 2.8 my first 2 terms at RU, but after I figured out the "trick" it went back above a 3.5.

I remember while being at RU, a bunch of the premeds had a discussion about how we felt screwed there. Some people I knew transferred out specifically because of that. I know some other universities have similar weed-out philosophies while others don't. SU didn't have one. Neither did Princeton U where a buddy of mine took a summer organic chem class with me and told me he was harder than anything he ever did at Princeton U (and he designed and patented a nanotech contact lens that cannot be mass produced yet because the tech doesn't exist to make it but it works in simulations).

At St. George's, some of the courses were taught very well. Others blew. If you're an SGU student like I was and if that same darned immunology professor is there you know what I'm talking about.

 

[DOC PENGUIN]

I think I had the following problems happen to me:

Me: I'm a Meyers Briggs ENTJ. That personality type hates medschool and won't do well on multiple choice tests even when we know the stuff well.

On my USMLEs, I barely passed each one. On USMLE 3, I scored in the top 1% in the computer simulation portion but did poorly on the multiple choice section. Given that both are supposed to measure one's medical knowledge (while the simulation is more tilted toward procedural knowledge and on the spot thinking), the big disparity in scores shows the Meyers Briggs theory holds up well there.

Outside of me: Another problem was I went to Rutgers U. for undergrad, a school where the overwhelming majority is premed. I'm talking several thousand students and the state med schools will only take up about 200 a year. The school openly weeds out students instead of fostering a culture of learning and encouragement. The premed office was usually cold and discouraging to premeds.

The biggest shame of that is you're put into a program where the University politics put research professors who don't want to teach into the 101 courses and it really kills the desire to learn. A buddy of mine was a bio major because he actually wanted to be a real biologist but being in that weed-out culture, he came to hate it. He had no intention of being a medical doctor but had to take the same classes where everyone was being weeded out.

The typical culture was to have a lecture, the profs were hardly at their office hours, you get exams, the exams were often times not indicative of what was in the book or in the class, the argument was the score was based off of a curve so "it has to be fair. There's a group that's above, in the middle and below." I figured this out my 4th year. To do well, each class had a trick and the trick was not based on actually learning the stuff. It had to do with things like getting every single old exam in the class and memorizing each question and answer because if you actually read the material, you wouldn't see it on the exam. The only way to get the old exams was to have a good social network because they weren't available from the class or bookstores.

I went to Syracuse U for a 2 years before I transferred to Rutgers, and I didn't decide to go premed till transferred but did take some premed courses at SU. There the courses were taught for real. My GPA was about a 3.8 when I left SU, dropped to about 2.8 my first 2 terms at RU, but after I figured out the "trick" it went back above a 3.5.

I remember while being at RU, a bunch of the premeds had a discussion about how we felt screwed there. Some people I knew transferred out specifically because of that. I know some other universities have similar weed-out philosophies while others don't. SU didn't have one. Neither did Princeton U where a buddy of mine took a summer organic chem class with me and told me he was harder than anything he ever did at Princeton U (and he designed and patented a nanotech contact lens that cannot be mass produced yet because the tech doesn't exist to make it but it works in simulations).

At St. George's, some of the courses were taught very well. Others blew. If you're an SGU student like I was and if that same darned immunology professor is there you know what I'm talking about.

It seems like your career was quite chaotic before you became an attending (i assume psychiatry? ) I believe that Psychiatry is in a crossroads of sorts. We are finding more and more information and yet we don't know how to delegate it. An example is DSM. I particularly don't like DSM, because it continues to grow by putting research on Behavior and inferences
rather than a biological cause of psychiatric problems. While we do know most Scheizophrenia, psychosis and Manic Depression are more or less "clean cut", ADHD as well as Depression and Autism are not. Research can become contradictory. (although, in my opinion, we should go back to the classical definition of Autism) Still, Psychiatrists are still able to be helpful and can provide light to those who need it. I see a psychiatrist, and i feel better after the hour. Still Psychiatry is still marginalized in the Medical field as well as pop culture. I would like to say the OP is better off becoming a Psychologist than a psych because he/she is less likely to be stereotyped, he/she would also would not need to go to med school. And while this is a stereotype, psychologists have the opportunity to use more talk therapy.

 

[Leo Aquarius]

It seems like your career was quite chaotic before you became an attending (i assume psychiatry? ) I believe that Psychiatry is in a crossroads of sorts. We are finding more and more information and yet we don't know how to delegate it. An example is DSM. I particularly don't like DSM, because it continues to grow by putting research on Behavior and inferences
rather than a biological cause of psychiatric problems. While we do know most Scheizophrenia, psychosis and Manic Depression are more or less "clean cut", ADHD as well as Depression and Autism are not. Research can become contradictory. (although, in my opinion, we should go back to the classical definition of Autism) Still, Psychiatrists are still able to be helpful and can provide light to those who need it. I see a psychiatrist, and i feel better after the hour. Still Psychiatry is still marginalized in the Medical field as well as pop culture. I would like to say the OP is better off becoming a Psychologist than a psych because he/she is less likely to be stereotyped, he/she would also would not need to go to med school. And while this is a stereotype, psychologists have the opportunity to use more talk therapy.

I don't know about pop culture, but one of the coolest and most trusted voices on radio by thousands of teenagers is Dr. Drew. He's famous and well-regarded in Hollywood. The show is Loveline and he's the physician on there. He's also Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Keck USC School of Medicine. Did you guys see him in the audience of Dancing with the Stars and the camera kept panning on him? How cool is that!

Psychiatrists can be very well regarded.

 

[nitemagi]

I don't know about pop culture, but one of the coolest and most trusted voices on radio by thousands of teenagers is Dr. Drew. He's famous and well-regarded in Hollywood. The show is Loveline and he's the physician on there. He's also Assistant Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at the Keck USC School of Medicine. Did you guys see him in the audience of Dancing with the Stars and the camera kept panning on him? How cool is that!

Psychiatrists can be very well regarded.

He's an internist, not a psychiatrist.

 

[st2205]

He's an internist, not a psychiatrist.

Oh. Well, at least we still have Dr. Laura, right? Right?

 

[Suenya]

xxxxxx

 

[belle54321]

Oh. Well, at least we still have Dr. Laura, right? Right?

Dr laura has a PhD in physiology.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

Dr laura has a PhD in physiology.

Thank god we don't have her. It's appalling that she puts herself out there as a counselor type of person giving all sorts of bad advice, though.

I'm pretty glad we also can't lay claim to Dr. Phil or Dr. Drew. In fact, I don't think there are many media ***** psychiatrists.

 

[AlexMack12]

I'm sorry for not giving my thanks earlier...had to have my laptop repaired and these kinds of sites just don't do well on smartphones

Anyway, thank you so very much to everyone who took the time to share their advice, experiences, and information with me. I would wager to say that all touched upon the very aspects of this decision that I am wrestling with, and your advice is absolutely invaluable.
I can tell each and every one of you are fantastic practitioners- whichever your exact field- and the mental health field is lucky to have you.

Thanks again!
Alex

 

[billypilgrim37]

Thank god we don't have her. It's appalling that she puts herself out there as a counselor type of person giving all sorts of bad advice, though.

I'm pretty glad we also can't lay claim to Dr. Phil or Dr. Drew. In fact, I don't think there are many media ***** psychiatrists.

Charles Krauthammer is a media ***** and a psychiatrist, but fortunately he doesn't overlap the two very much.

Fox News has Keith Ablow, who is a certified asshat. Few people give me as abject a visceral reaction as he does.

 

[Chimed]

Charles Krauthammer is a media ***** and a psychiatrist, but fortunately he doesn't overlap the two very much.

Fox News has Keith Ablow, who is a certified asshat. Few people give me as abject a visceral reaction as he does.

I know who he is but don't know much about him. Why is he an "asshat"? (Sorry, but I love that..."asshat" I'm very immature.)

 

[st2205]

Charles Krauthammer is a media ***** and a psychiatrist, but fortunately he doesn't overlap the two very much.

Fox News has Keith Ablow, who is a certified asshat. Few people give me as abject a visceral reaction as he does.

Nor does he go by Dr. Krauthammer. That being said, I like him.

 

[whopper]

Drs. Laura and Phil are pure examples of media ******.

Dr. Phil even said in an interview that he's not practicing formal psychology. Honest, but he projects to the public that he is a psychologist and calls himself "doctor." The guy lost his license before he got his show.

Dr. Laura doesn't have a doctorate in mental health, and while she does have some mental health training, but it's not to the degree where I'm impressed by it and she's no doctor in it.

She's an example of people wanting style over substance. When I say style, I don't mean real style, I'm talking a WWE-like grudge-match histrionicism that is not being fair to WWE because they don't claim or pretend to be real. The only good thing I can say for her is, hey, she made money off of what she did but she is what I'd consider a professional prostitute. Now I'm not being fair to prostitutes either.

Krauthammer, I don't like the guy, but I'll give him credit in the sense that he doesn't claim to use his psychiatric training in his opinions, at least as far as I can tell. I don't like most talking heads no matter the political stripe because when they're wrong they don't admit to it. They just stop talking about the issue they're wrong on and during their show, where they control the content, just ignore the callers that wanted to talk about it. With the exception of Al Franken, (and trust me I don't agree with Franken on everything), I've never seen a talking head pundit try to claim responsibility for being wrong on an issue. Franken used to have a segment of his show on Air America where he addressed areas he was wrong on from prior shows.

I don't think there are many media ***** psychiatrists.

Oh there are. Trust me there are enough ****** out there in any field including ours. Maybe one hasn't become as much as a household name as Dr. Phil, but when you've seen a guy who's now a program director at a namebrand university say anything to get his client off, even when he didn't believe it.....

There's a particular forensic psychiatrist that's often spoken of as being a big media ***** but I'll not mention him because the community is so small, I might unfortunately have to sit down next to the guy at some point, and I have been in the position of pointing out a ***** before and then being forced to sit next to him at some type of APA event. Awkward to say the least.

 

[DOC PENGUIN]

Drs. Laura and Phil are pure examples of media ******.

Dr. Phil even said in an interview that he's not practicing formal psychology. Honest, but he projects to the public that he is a psychologist and calls himself "doctor." The guy lost his license before he got his show.

Dr. Laura doesn't have a doctorate in mental health, and while she does have some mental health training, but it's not to the degree where I'm impressed by it and she's no doctor in it.

She's an example of people wanting style over substance. When I say style, I don't mean real style, I'm talking a WWE-like grudge-match histrionicism that is not being fair to WWE because they don't claim or pretend to be real. The only good thing I can say for her is, hey, she made money off of what she did but she is what I'd consider a professional prostitute. Now I'm not being fair to prostitutes either.

Krauthammer, I don't like the guy, but I'll give him credit in the sense that he doesn't claim to use his psychiatric training in his opinions, at least as far as I can tell. I don't like most talking heads no matter the political stripe because when they're wrong they don't admit to it. They just stop talking about the issue they're wrong on and during their show, where they control the content, just ignore the callers that wanted to talk about it. With the exception of Al Franken, (and trust me I don't agree with Franken on everything), I've never seen a talking head pundit try to claim responsibility for being wrong on an issue. Franken used to have a segment of his show on Air America where he addressed areas he was wrong on from prior shows.

Oh there are. Trust me there are enough ****** out there in any field including ours. Maybe one hasn't become as much as a household name as Dr. Phil, but when you've seen a guy who's now a program director at a namebrand university say anything to get his client off, even when he didn't believe it.....

There's a particular forensic psychiatrist that's often spoken of as being a big media ***** but I'll not mention him because the community is so small, I might unfortunately have to sit down next to the guy at some point, and I have been in the position of pointing out a ***** before and then being forced to sit next to him at some type of APA event. Awkward to say the least.

I think Nathan Kline and Bob Spitzer are pretty good, more so the former. Kline pioneered psychopharamacology and Bob started the DSM (arguably good or bad.) However a psychiatrist that should be famous is Robert Cancro, he is a professor of Psychiatry in NYU since '76 and was head of the program for the time. One of the things he was known for was research into a biological definition of Psychiatric illnesses. Another was that he taught freudian ideas and made sure psychotherapy was taught to everybody in the program (apparently it was starting to fade.)