psychopharmacology

[CaMD]

I'm a 4th year medical student planning on going into psychiatry. I'm more interested in psychopharmacology than psychotherapy. What residency programs would be the best fit for that? (I'd prefer to be on the west coast, but would consider other parts of the country if I have to...)

Thanks for any ideas!

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[whopper]

I don't know which specific programs may be better at psychopharm because its not like I've been trained at several programs.

However Stephen Stahl is considered one of the foremost experts in the field & is at UC San Diego.

 

[strangeglove]

Some of the programs in the Midwest, such as Iowa and WashU, focus pretty much exclusively on psychopharm. In my opinion, they do this to their detriment, though they are well-regarded propgrams.

 

[erg923]

Jose DeLeon is highly regarded in psychopharm..he is at Kentucky.....although the program itself is pretty well balanced I've heard.

 

[Doc Samson]

Long-timers around here will know this is a pet peeve of mine, so please excuse the soapbox, but...

We're supposed to be psychiatrists. You can't be board certified as a psychopharmacologist because there's no such thing. Training focused only on medication excludes 75% of what psychiatrists should know. Go get well-rounded training and if you choose to practice primarily in medication management, then fine. If you don't train in something, how can you evaluate its utility or whether you'd want to practice it? I posted a link a while ago to the article "The Problem of the Psychopharmacologist" (I think that's the title) in Academic Psychiatry by some former colleagues of mine (Querques, Kontos, Freudenreich - not sure about the order). Important reading for all considering psychiatry residency.

 

[1viking]

http://ap.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/abstract/30/3/218

Now, if I could only get my stinking APA membership to work so I can read it!

 

[sunlioness]

Long-timers around here will know this is a pet peeve of mine, so please excuse the soapbox, but...

We're supposed to be psychiatrists. You can't be board certified as a psychopharmacologist because there's no such thing. Training focused only on medication excludes 75% of what psychiatrists should know. Go get well-rounded training and if you choose to practice primarily in medication management, then fine. If you don't train in something, how can you evaluate its utility or whether you'd want to practice it? I posted a link a while ago to the article "The Problem of the Psychopharmacologist" (I think that's the title) in Academic Psychiatry by some former colleagues of mine (Querques, Kontos, Freudenreich - not sure about the order). Important reading for all considering psychiatry residency.

Absolutely. I was trying to think of how to say just this without coming across a total jerk. Thank you.

 

[CaMD]

Thank you, I appreciate the program suggestions and will look into those.

I feel a little defensive in the face of a couple of the responses, though I know they were well intentioned. I didn't say "wow, I hate psychotherapy, how can I avoid it?" I want a program that will help me become a well-rounded psychiatrist. But there was a post asking about programs particularly strong in psychotherapy training and I was curious about the opposite. (I assume those programs noted as especially strong in psychotherapy don't just avoid drugs altogether...)

 

[BabyPsychDoc]

Thank you, I appreciate the program suggestions and will look into those.

I feel a little defensive in the face of a couple of the responses, though I know they were well intentioned. I didn't say "wow, I hate psychotherapy, how can I avoid it?" I want a program that will help me become a well-rounded psychiatrist. But there was a post asking about programs particularly strong in psychotherapy training and I was curious about the opposite. (I assume those programs noted as especially strong in psychotherapy don't just avoid drugs altogether...)

Next time, try asking if you could find a program that would be a better fit for biological psychiatry, or neuroscience. Essentially the same thing, but asking about psychopharmacology as opposed to psychotherapy makes you sound like a drug-pusher wannabe rather than a thoughtful clinician.

Just my 2p.

 

[Doc Samson]

Thank you, I appreciate the program suggestions and will look into those.

I feel a little defensive in the face of a couple of the responses, though I know they were well intentioned. I didn't say "wow, I hate psychotherapy, how can I avoid it?" I want a program that will help me become a well-rounded psychiatrist. But there was a post asking about programs particularly strong in psychotherapy training and I was curious about the opposite. (I assume those programs noted as especially strong in psychotherapy don't just avoid drugs altogether...)

It takes a lot of effort for a program to train a resident in psychotherapy (intense supervision for each case, hours of clinic time set aside for a panel of patients) for relatively little (if any) reimbursement. Resident med clinics, on the other hand, are pretty easy to set up, require less intense supervision, and are generally better paid by insurers. So some programs really will do all they can to meet the scantest of ACGME requirements for psychotherapy training while selling it as a "psychopharmacologically" focused training experience. That said, some of the programs mentioned above (UCSD, for example) do provide excellent training in both. All in all, my philosophy on residency training remains that you should get the best generalist training you can and specialize later. Choosing a residency based on one aspect of practice is like choosing a med school because you think you want to be a pediatric neurosurgeon.