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By Catherine Robertson Souter
Technology, managed care and governmental regulations have changed
the way psychologists do business. That fact is nowhere more evident
than in schools and training programs across the country where educators
struggle to keep up with a field that is developing at an ever-
increasing pace.
The UMass University Health Services APA-approved training program,
for example, is a different animal than what many of today's psychologists
would recognize. In a world where managed care has severely shortened
the average time a patient is in therapy, the training program is
built on the idea that doctoral students need to be well-versed
in the brief therapy model.
"Over the last 10 years, the training program has moved to deal
with the pressures and realities of the managed care environment
and toward doing brief therapy as opposed to doing therapy briefly,"
says Edward Bynum, Ph.D., A.B.P.P., director of behavioral medicine
for University Health Services. "While most training centers have
a de facto brief therapy unit, we have brief therapy as a focus;
the emphasis is on brief therapy."
Today, training programs, out of necessity, must provide for a
variety of perspectives, especially as psychology has itself branched
out and found its way into a variety of institutions. From military
psychology to online therapy, the areas that are open to a new graduate
appear limitless.
For instance, as a college-based clinic in a remote area of the
state, the UMass program offers trainees an opportunity to work
with both students and the general population in crisis situations,
stress-related illnesses and other typical psychological issues
that plague the general public.
Each of the program's three doctoral interns will see more than
100 clients during the course of the yearlong program. In addition
to the doctoral students, the program works with one post-graduate
intern and offers a nine-month program for two social workers each
year.
Beyond its diverse client base, the UMass program offers a variety
of benefits for trainees. It is, as Bynum points out, one of the
few programs that provides year-long training in behavioral medicine
and biofeedback and a formal training in clinical hypnosis in addition
to offering training in "solid, traditional, standard psychological
diagnosis assessment." In addition, the center prides itself on
being multi-cultural and actively recruiting a mixed staff to work
with the culturally diverse student population.
The program also offers a more clinically oriented training than
many others, adds Kent Poey, Ph.D., A.B.P.P., the director of the
psychological internship training and assistant director of the
mental health services.
"We are called a practitioner/scientist based program and we look
for interns who want to do a lot of clinical work," he explains.
"Most programs tend to be scientist/practitioner programs where
research perhaps takes up more time in an intern's week."
Dealing with short-term, crisis intervention on a college campus
can be an eye-opening experience. The issues that normally come
up during the pressurized college years are only exacerbated these
days by world-wide tensions, students being called up to serve the
country overseas and fears of terrorist reprisals.
"Like most other university facilities, the seriousness of pathology
of cases we see has significantly increased. This is a national
trend," Bynum says.
Poey agrees. "We see a lot of serious disorders, probably one-third
of our clients have a very serious diagnosis. It gets more pathological
each year. These are national statistics," he says. "Why? If anyone
knew the answer to that, they would win the Nobel Prize."
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