The 2024-2025 JPS Doctoral Internship in Health Services Psychology will include two tracks, including the Generalist Clinical Track [Match ID 246811] and the Integrated Primary Care Track [Match ID 246812]. Interested applicants may apply for one or both tracks.
Program website: https://jpshealthnet.org/medical-professionals/residency-programs/psychology.
Both 12-month internship tracks are designed to train competent, technically skilled, theoretically equipped clinicians who know how to adapt approach, communication style and method to the needs of a highly diverse, underserved population with complex clinical needs. From week one of the training year, our interns are introduced to fast-paced, high-acuity, multidisciplinary clinical settings that require psychologists to deliver actionable, impactful results. A practitioner-scholar framework is used as interns learn to integrate empirical data with clinical acumen to serve the unique needs of each patient in their care. Our intern’s professional growth is supported through intensive supervision and relevant educational experiences embedded within a carefully structured developmental framework that culminates in the ability to function independently as a professional psychologist.
TRACK DESCRIPTIONS
Generalist Clinical Track [Match ID 246811]: Interns in this track train within three major rotations – each 4 months long -- as described below. Additional minor rotation information is found on the program’s website.
Neuropsychological / Psychological Assessment Rotation: Psychological and neuropsychological assessment results support the clinical decision-making of multidisciplinary care teams operating within a large full-spectrum Psychiatric and Behavioral Health service. Results are used to establish level / quality of cognitive functioning, clarify diagnoses, assess risk of near-term suicidal or other-directed violent acts, and/or to provide treatment recommendations.
Psychotherapy Rotation: Both group and individual therapy formats are used to address issues such as mood dysregulation, anger management, psychological trauma, and relationship problems. We include experience with both psychodynamically-informed and CBT-informed therapy modalities, ensuring that the rotation exposes interns to the depth case conceptualizations available when using these contrasting approaches.
Inpatient Consult Psychology Rotation: Intensive psychological evaluation, intervention and consultative services support the multi-disciplinary specialty care teams treating JPS’s medically ill inpatients. On this rotation, psychology interns learn to provide interventions addressing substance and acute stress-related issues, conduct capacity evaluations, and address a wide range of patient management concerns.
Integrated Primary Care Track [Match ID 246812]: Interns in this track will conduct a majority of their clinical activities in Primary Care settings with additional opportunities for minor rotations in other hospital and medical education settings based on intern interest and availability. They complete a longitudinal major rotation for the duration of their 12-month internship (3 days per week) working as part of an interdisciplinary team in a primary care teaching clinic. Additional minor rotation information is found on the program’s website.
Integrated Primary Care Rotation: Interns work within three high-volume clinical sites that serve mostly urban, underserved patients. The patient population across these sites is somewhat diverse, and includes a clinical center for resettled refugee patients from a number of international sites, as well as a cancer treatment center. While the populations and settings vary slightly across these sites, the clinical training, service provision, supervision, and clinical schedules remain consistent. Common referrals across these settings are made to address anxiety, depression, addiction, somatization, sleep issues, trauma, coping with medical conditions, lifestyle counseling/health behavior change, grief/adjustment, relationship/family issues, chronic pain, and smoking cessation. Work within these sites heavily emphasizes coordination of care with professionals from Family Medicine, Pulmonology, Oncology, nursing, clinical pharmacy, social work/case management, and medical interpreters (language services).
OTHER TRAINING EXPERIENCES -- BOTH TRACKS:
Didactics: A minimum of three didactics sessions per week are presented throughout the training year offering advanced training in all nine Profession Wide Competencies. In addition, one hour of Journal Club, Case Conference, or Psychiatry-Psychology Grand Rounds occurs weekly.
Other routinely offered experiences: Peer supervision, observational experiences with JPS’s Street Medicine team, hospital Ethics Committee and Mental Illness Court.