Academic Psychiatrist Research Articles

Merging academic medicine with community activism: an academic psychiatrist chronicles her day Monday, November 25, 2002.

Merging academic medicine with community activism: an academic psychiatrist chronicles her day Monday, November 25, 2002.

A Friday in the life of an academic psychiatrist.

A Friday in the life of an academic psychiatrist.

A silver anniversary for one Asian American academic psychiatrist.

A silver anniversary for one Asian American academic psychiatrist.

Reflections on a day in the life of an academic psychiatrist.

Reflections on a day in the life of an academic psychiatrist.

The endurance voyage: an academic psychiatrist shares the details of his daily adventures.

The endurance voyage: an academic psychiatrist shares the details of his daily adventures.

Father Arseny, 1893–1973: Priest, Prisoner, Spiritual Father • Father Arseny: A Cloud of Witnesses

Father Arseny, 1893–1973: Priest, Prisoner, Spiritual Father • Father Arseny: A Cloud of Witnesses

Handbook of Psychiatric Education and Faculty Development

Back to table of contents Previous article Next article Book ReviewFull AccessHandbook of Psychiatric Education and Faculty DevelopmentRobert J. Ronis, M.D., M.P.H.Robert J. RonisSearch for more papers by this author, M.D., M.P.H.Published Online:1 Sep 2000https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ps.51.9.1187AboutSectionsPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack Citations ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InEmail An expertly crafted synopsis of what the editors call "the collective wisdom of outstanding psychiatric educators, researchers, and administrators," the Handbook of Psychiatric Education and Faculty Development is a veritable primer for the academic psychiatrist. Greatly expanded from the 1991 Handbook of Psychiatry Residency Training (1), this new handbook adds chapters on career development, research, and administration and expands its education chapters to encompass undergraduate, subspecialty, and continuing medical education.Section 1 addresses career paths in academic psychiatry, with chapters on academic development, writing for publication, and the role of professional organizations in professional development. Vicissitudes of individual interests, personality, and cognitive styles are considered alongside the history of academic medicine, current issues of diminishing resources, and new and emerging faculty roles in the era of managed care. Practical strategies for career development, principles of education and acquiring teaching skills, and a guide to publishing for the early-career academic are offered, as are special strategies for women, cultural and ethnic minorities, and international graduates seeking academic advancement.Developing a research portfolio is the focus of section 2. A comparison of types of research from basic sciences to clinical trials and a delineation of their roles in the academic culture of the individual department is undertaken. Technical training, mentoring, and the "life cycle of the researcher" are considered, along with funding strategies and the challenges and opportunities for unfunded research.By far the longest part of the handbook, section 3, traces the development of preclinical and clinical undergraduate curricula; residency and subspecialty training; selection, evaluation, and monitoring of students and residents; collaboration with other specialties; special problems and events; and continuing medical education. Core undergraduate curricula in behavioral science, various teaching formats, and the role of electronic media are contrasted with basic skills acquisition and administrative issues in the clinical clerkship. Model goals and objectives, psychiatric "screens," and evaluation forms are offered, as are timely suggestions for cross-disciplinary teaching. The application of general systems theory to the administration of residency training programs is considered, with practical examples of sample curricula and a task calendar for the training coordinator.Chapters on special requirements and certification focus on the process of accreditation, and these chapters maintain their applicability despite recent revisions of the Residency Review Committee for Psychiatry. The next handbook will undoubtedly supplement the sections on evaluation to reflect new requirements for demonstrating competencies.Section 4 provides an introduction to psychiatric administration, with a discussion of the various roles, characteristics, and skill-sets of effective administrators; an overview of the relationship of health care systems and the public sector to academic psychiatry; and a discussion of our Canadian colleagues' approach to diminishing academic resources.In sum, the Handbook of Psychiatric Education and Faculty Development is a practical guide for academic psychiatrists at all stages of their careers. Highly readable and masterfully edited for consistency, it is a must-read for new or potential faculty members and an equally suitable overview for a new or interim department chair.Dr. Ronis is vice-chair for education and director of public psychiatry at University Hospitals of Cleveland and associate professor and interim chair of the department of psychiatry at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.edited by Jerald Kay, M.D., Edward K. Silberman., M.D., and Linda Pessar, M.D.; Washington, D.C., American Psychiatric Press, 1999, 660 pages, $52

The Black Woman Academic Psychiatrist

The various influences contributing to the decision of black women psychiatric residents to select a career in academic medicine are explored. The role of mentors and national fellowships in facilitating the development of the professional identity of black psychiatrists are discussed. The complexity of a black woman as an academic psychiatrist is presented in the context of examples of coping strategies. These strategies ameliorate negative interactions and anticipated questions of competence, leadership, and the effective mastery of confrontation. Specific experiences unique to the black academic psychiatrist, including the effect of gender and race on various interactions, are illustrated. Career development, from the first academic position following residency training to the transition to associate professor, are reviewed with attention to the specific concerns unique to each stage.

Career Paths in Psychiatry: Some Antecedents and Concomitants

Factors preceding and accompanying the career paths of 111 psychiatrists who graduated from the Stanford University residency program during the years 1965–1975, were studied through a survey, using multiple regression as main analytic technique. Antecedent variables predicting the path of the full-time academic psychiatrist included having had a research residency, perceiving the residency program as relevant, being a foreign medical school graduate, and being male; while associated concomitant variables included number of journal articles and book chapters published, no formal continuing education reported, not living in California, and living in the South. The career paths of the clinical faculty psychiatrist, the non-academically affiliated clinician and the administratively oriented psychiatrist were similarly studied.

Teaching meditation to medical students

Given the secular and scientific atmosphere of most current American medical practice, the current high degree of interest in meditative techniques among laymen1 has been met with a mixture of surprise and hostility by the medical community. As a result of increasing media exposure, patients have begun to expect that physicians know something about these techniques and about their medical applications. Pressure from patients is supplemented by several careful physiological and clinical studies that have produced noteworthy results.2 Unfortunately, this growth of public interest has not been matched by a similar development in the information level of practicing physicians on the subject. Part of this lag may be attributed to traditional medical conservatism, which probably plays a useful role in protecting patients from ineffective or dangerous health care fads. In addition to the conservatism of physicians, however, certain characteristics of the meditative systems themselves have made it easy for doctors to avoid this subject and to dismiss it when patients raise it. Many meditative techniques originate in cultures that are perceived by some Ameri cans as foreign, "primitive," or both. Physicians also worry about the religious implications of some meditative systems and about "mixing" science and religion. In addition, there is a great deal of variability in technical expertness and professional integrity among different teachers and techniques both here and abroad. In an effort to introduce medical students to meditative techniques while their scientific orientation was most intense and before they had a chance to develop extensive professional "prejudices," I offered an elective course in Meditation and Healing for firstand second-year students at the Temple University School of Medicine. My perspective was that of a full-time academic psychiatrist who had studied several meditative systems and had employed