The Psychiatric Institute of Washington is a 110 bed private psychiatric hospital located in northwest Washington, DC. We provide inpatient psychiatric care to a racially, ethinically, and culturally diverse patient population due to our location in the nation's capital.
The Psychiatric Institute of Washington (PIW) Clinical Psychology Internship Program has been proudly training interns since 1999. We currently offer two positions in our one-year, full-time, pre-doctoral internship program. The PIW Psychology Department maintains a philosophy that effective internship training requires a balance of clinical experience, supervision, and didactic training in an environment that provides encouragement and challenge.
The training program uses the scholar-practitioner model, which emphasizes the application of scholarly knowledge to the practice of psychology based on the scientific foundations of the profession. This is an intensive program designed to prepare post-docs to function successfully as clinical psychologists. Post-docs have the opportunity to conduct individual and group therapy, conduct psychological assessments, provide supervision for externs, participate in multidisciplinary treatment planning meetings, participate in family meetings, and attend in-house training seminars. Post-docs also participate in multiple didactic seminars that include individual therapy, supervision, and research.
We offer three 6 month rotations, in addition to general inpatient training: 1) Partial Hospitalization Program-Intensive Outpatient Program- Post-traumatic Disorders Program, our nationally known inpatient trauma treatment program for adults, who present with PTSD and often, Dissociative Disorders; 2) the Adolescent Treatment Unit, providing individual and group therapy to patients age 11 to 17; and 3) the Clinical Assessment Center, conducting assessments for admission to the hospital.
We strongly emphasize training in supervision and consultation throughout the post-doctoral year. By the end of the year, post-docs will be well versed in providing clinical supervision as well as clinical consultations to other treatment providers. We provide a supervision of supervision seminar throughout the training year.
Our post-docs have gone on to work in psychiatric hospitals, but also in a wide range of settings including community mental health clinics, college counseling centers and private practices. The skills learned and training received during the internship year are applicable to many clinical enivronments.