Curriculum Across All Four Years
Clinical Case Conference
Residents participate in weekly case conferences throughout residency in both inpatient and outpatient settings. Cases from current clinical experiences are presented and discussed with faculty, emphasizing interviewing skills, biopsychosocial formulation, psychopharmacology, and comprehensive treatment planning. As residents advance, conferences evolve to reflect changing clinical responsibilities. During the PGY-3 and PGY-4 years, conferences expand to outpatient cases discussed with resident cohorts, faculty supervision groups, and interdisciplinary ambulatory treatment teams. PGY-4 residents also serve in a supervisory role, assisting with conference feedback.
Process Groups
This PGY-specific group allows for collaboration, professional growth and peer support within a PGY-class. Residents discuss clinical experiences, challenges encountered during training, and practical aspects of residency while learning about themselves and their work from their peers with the help of dedicated faculty facilitators.
Journal Club
Residents from all four years participate in Journal Club to develop skills in critical appraisal of the psychiatric literature. Faculty with expertise in each topic facilitate discussion of landmark and contemporary publications while emphasizing evidence-based clinical practice and thoughtful application of research findings.
Grand Rounds
Residents attend the department’s Grand Rounds series featuring nationally recognized speakers and multidisciplinary presentations on advances in psychiatry, clinical care, education, and research. The PGY-3 class prepares an annual Ground Rounds presentation, while each PGY-4 resident delivers an individual scholarly presentation highlighting an area of clinical interest, academic work, quality improvement, education, or research.
Combined Didactic Seminar Series
PGY-1 & PGY-2
Emergency Psychiatry, Crisis Intervention, & Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry
A longitudinal case-based conference integrating emergency psychiatry, crisis intervention, and consultation-liaison psychiatry. Residents develop skills in managing psychiatric emergencies, suicide and violence risk assessment, and psychiatric presentations in acute medical settings. There is a focus on and psychiatric considerations and differentials in treatment of the medically-complex patients.
PGY-2 & PGY-3
Neurobiology
A neuroscience curriculum progressing from foundational concepts to advanced applications in psychiatry. Topics include molecular and genetic neuroscience, neurochemistry, neuroendocrinology, neuroimmunology, and their clinical relevance to major psychiatric disorders and psychopharmacology.
Forensic Psychiatry
A curriculum covering essential topics in forensic psychiatry including civil commitment, competency, expert testimony, informed consent, mental health law, and ethics. Residents also participate in experiential learning, including a mock trial with attorneys and site visits to observe forensic evaluations.
Culture Seminar
This seminar explores how culture, community context, and lived experience influence psychiatric illness, treatment engagement, and patient care. Residents learn from community partners and mentors to better understand and provide culturally-informed psychiatric care across a broad array of clinical settings.
Geriatric Psychiatry
This seminar focuses on the evaluation and treatment of psychiatric illness in older adults, including neurocognitive disorders, late-life mood disorders, psychosis, along with psychopharmacologic considerations in older adults. Residents also explore the medical, ethical, and psychosocial considerations unique to caring for an aging population.
Research Methods & Scholarship
Residents develop skills in research design, biostatistics, critical appraisal of the literature, and scholarly inquiry. The curriculum supports evidence-based practice while preparing residents to participate in research, quality improvement, and other scholarly activities.
Year-Specific Curriculum
PGY-1
Foundations of Psychiatry
This foundational course introduces residents to the core principles of psychiatric practices. Beginning with psychiatric interviewing, the mental status examination, psychiatric emergencies, and basic psychopharmacology, the curriculum progresses through the diagnosis, evaluation, and treatment of major psychiatric disorders while introducing residents to a broad range of subspecialty topics and faculty across the department.
Biopsychosocial Formulation
During the Biopsychosocial (BPS) Rotation, residents develop skills in comprehensive psychiatric assessment through an in-depth exploration of developmental, psychological, relational, and social factors that contribute to illness. Weekly written formulations, relevant literature, and faculty discussion help residents integrate clinical information into thoughtful diagnostic formulations and individualized treatment plans.
Reactions to Patients
This reflective seminar encourages residents to examine their own emotional responses within the therapeutic relationship and understand how these reactions influence patient care. Through faculty-facilitated discussion, residents explore the interpersonal dynamics of psychiatric care, enhancing their ability to build therapeutic alliances and navigate the emotional component of clinical work.
PGY-2
Clinical Psychopharmacology
This course provides a comprehensive review of evidence-based pharmacologic treatment for major psychiatric disorders. Clinical decision making is integrated with neuroscience to deepen understanding of medication selection, treatment strategies, and management of complex patients.
Introduction to Psychotherapy
Residents are introduced to the core principles shared across psychotherapy modalities, with a focus on learning the foundations of long-term psychodynamic psychotherapy. The course emphasizes therapeutic intervention, case conceptualization, and application of theory to residents’ own psychotherapy patients.
Ways of Listening
Using live interviews, observation, and faculty feedback, residents refine advanced interviewing techniques and develop skills in assessment and treatment planning. The course prepares residents for competency-based clinical skills assessments through structured case discussions, observed interviews, and individualized feedback.
Normal Development & Developmental Psychopathology
Residents examine typical child and adolescent development alongside the biological, psychological, and social factors that contribute to developmental psychopathology. The curriculum provides a developmental framework that informs a psychodynamic lens to treatment across the lifespan.
PGY-3
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy
Residents receive structured instruction in cognitive-behavioral therapy through faculty-led seminars and case discussion. Residents provide CBT in the outpatient setting and review their cases regularly with faculty and peers, developing skills in CBT formulation and evidence-based therapeutic interventions.
Couples & Family Therapy
This course explores the role of family dynamics in psychiatric illness and treatment through an introduction to family systems theory and contemporary models of couples & family therapy. Through faculty-led seminars, case discussions, and supervised clinical work with couples and families, residents develop foundational skills in family assessment and family-based therapeutic interventions.
Group Therapy
Residents learn the principles of group psychotherapy through faculty-led seminars and supervised clinical experience leading outpatient therapy groups. Seminars focus on group development, leadership, and therapeutic process. Ongoing supervision emphasizes recognizing and managing group dynamics while integrating psychodynamic, interpersonal, and cognitive-behavioral approaches to foster therapeutic change.
Advanced Psychopharmacology
This seminar expands upon the PGY-2 psychopharmacology curriculum by exploring complex medication management, treatment-resistant illness, and emerging therapies, in a case-based format. Residents examine the neurobiological and neurochemical mechanisms underlying psychotropic medications, integrating receptor pharmacology and current literature into evidence-based clinical decision making.
Advanced Psychotherapy Topics
This advanced seminar builds upon residents’ psychotherapy training by exploring specialized therapeutic approaches. Topics include: Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), short-term psychodynamic psychotherapy, Mentalization-Based Therapy (MBT), trauma-focused psychotherapies, clinical approaches to the longitudinal management of personality disorders, and other psychotherapy modalities.
PGY-4
Psychoanalytic Theory
This seminar explores the evolution of psychoanalytic thought from Freud through contemporary psychodynamic theory. Led by psychoanalytic faculty, the course emphasizes the clinical application of psychoanalytic concepts to complex cases.
Special Issues in Psychiatry
This discussion-based seminar examines important contemporary issues affecting psychiatric practices through the perspectives of healthcare systems, public policy, ethics, and forensic psychiatry. Residents engage with faculty to analyze evolving clinical, legal, and professional considerations relevant to psychiatric practices.
Systems, Supervision, & Team Leadership
Designed to prepare residents for the transition to fellowship or independent practice, this seminar focuses on leadership, supervision, healthcare systems, administration, interdisciplinary collaboration, and medical education. Residents develop practical skills necessary for functioning as attending psychiatrists while gaining insight into organizational and healthcare system dynamics.