PGY-3 Year

Clinical training in your third year centers on a year-long rotation in outpatient psychiatry. You will work primarily at the Erie County Medical Center, but you’ll also rotate up to a full day per week at an alternate site, gaining experience treating a variety of patients in different clinical settings. These sites include:

At the Erie County Medical Center (ECMC) Outpatient Psychiatry Clinics, you will care for a cadre of outpatients as part of a team, learning how to assess appropriate levels of care and collaborate with treatment providers in different disciplines to treat patients with pharmacotherapy. You will be assigned two psychotherapy supervisors and an on-site supervisors, all of whom will meet with you at least once a week.  

The patients you see come from a range of backgrounds and include  those with both psychiatric and substance abuse disorders. Every week, you will take part in interdisciplinary team meetings to discuss patient management, including psychopharmacology issues and psychological factors affecting treatment.

At Horizon Health Services, you will rotate for one half day a week at this community mental health clinic, focusing exclusively on engaging patients with addiction disorders using motivational interviewing techniques.

In addition, you will continue to see patients for psychotherapy, many of whom will be in long-term psychotherapy.

One half day per week, during time protected from clinical responsibilities, you will continue to take didactic seminars. The didactic curriculum for PGY-3 and 4 residents is combined and rotates on a two-year cycle. Seminar topics include child and adolescent psychiatry, forensic psychiatry, making the transition to practice, public psychiatry and the history of psychiatry.

You will interact with and teach third- and fourth-year medical students throughout this rotation and serve as a preceptor for small group learning. You may also teach in the didactic curriculum for third-year clerks.