Winter 2011 Newsletter - McLean Hospital - Harvard University

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PERMIT NO. 58168
An update on adult residency training
continued from page 5
Members of the Class of 2011 are the first residents who do not take oral
board exams as part of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology
(ABPN) certification. Residents are now required to take only one
computerized board-certification exam in the fall after graduation. This
change includes an interviewing verification process during residency
to ensure that residents have attained basic psychiatric interview skills
prior to applying for the board exam. We anticipate more changes in
which the Accreditation Council for Graduate Medical Education (ACG-
ME) and ABPN monitor residents in annual surveys and tracking systems
designed to catalogue residency accomplishments in an ongoing, rather
than a summative, manner.
In addition to this change, the ACGME has established new regulations
limiting first-year residents from working more than 16-hour shifts. New
residents also must have an attending physician in the room with them,
unless it can be verified that they can work without direct supervision
(though immediately available, if necessary). We are fortunate not to
depend on our PGY-1s for overnight call. All overnight call at both MGH
and McLean is done as a night-float system during PGY-2. And during the
APS rotation, shifts are only 12 hours long. All of these changes enhance
the education of our junior residents!
Our research concentration appears to be paying off—particularly this
year, with nine of our residents having presented posters at the 2011 Harvard
Psychiatry Research Day Poster Session and Mysell Lecture Day.
Two residents were awarded the Harry and Maida Solomon Prize: Joan
Comprodon, MD, MPH, PhD, for his presentation titled “Simultaneous
TMS and fMRI to Study Effective Neural Connectivity, Adaptive Plasticity
and Therapeutic Neuromodulation of Attentional Networks” and Michael
Halassa, MD, PhD, MPH, for his presentation titled “Integrated Optogenetics
with Multi-site Electrode Recordings for Investigation of Thalamocortical
Oscillations In Vivo.” These two posters stood out from among
nearly 200 displayed by Harvard researchers.
It is amazing to work with so many talented and wonderful people
involved with residency training. Our students are among the best in the
country and our faculty are diverse, accomplished and national and international
leaders in all areas of psychiatry. We value hearing from our past
residents, so please keep us posted on your latest accomplishments and
developments. It is an honor and privilege for all of us within the program
to have contributed to your careers. ♦
Alumni News is collaboratively produced by Cecelia O’Neal, MSc, operations director for Business Development, and Alumni Association chairpersons
Kathy Sanders MD, Dost Öngür, MD, PhD, and Francis de Marneffe, MD. © 2011, McLean Hospital.