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MESSAGE FROM THE CHAIRMAN

David J. Kupfer, M.D.The Department of Psychiatry at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine is a national leader in clinical care, research, and education. Building on a long-standing tradition of excellence, the Department offers a flexible and comprehensive residency training program designed to prepare graduates for prominent positions in basic and clinical psychiatric research, clinical care, education and training, and psychiatric administration, by exposing them to contemporary theories and practices.

In keeping with the precepts of modern psychiatry, one of the principal objectives of our residency training program - which integrates child, adolescent, and adult psychiatry - is to prepare scientist-clinicians who not only seek research and academic careers but also want to acquire the clinical skills and knowledge needed to practice psychiatry at its most contemporary and informed levels. To this end, the Department seeks to create an exciting academic climate and provide the requisite opportunities for residents to pursue their intellectual interests while developing clinical and laboratory skills and acquiring the experience needed to further their research careers beyond their residencies. A research track within the residency program is available for residents who wish to pursue a career focusing on research.

The academic medical center of the 21st century must meet the demands of clinical service, training, and research within a health care environment that is constantly changing. The explosion of neurobiological research, coupled with the market forces of health care reform, will make this era both exciting and challenging. The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the Western Psychiatric Institute and Clinic (WPIC) are uniquely qualified to lead this revolution. We are the foremost non-governmental site of psychiatric research in the United States, second only to the National Institute of Mental Health's intramural program in size and scope. We are also a regional provider of medical and psychiatric care for the tri-state are of western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, and eastern Ohio, and are the major provider of mental health care services to the chronically and persistently mentally ill of Allegheny and the adjoining counties in Pennsylvania. These functions define WPIC as a regional and national force in academic and public sector psychiatry, and place us at the forefront of health care initiatives to treat homeless, substance dependent, and forensic psychiatric patients.

The Department and WPIC also have an international reputation for initiatives in international health care and human rights. Teams of psychiatrists from WPIC have helped to address psychiatric abuses in the former Soviet Union and have delivered mental health care to orphaned children with neuropsychiatric disorders in Romania.

In our effort to train psychiatry's future leaders, we seek to attract residents whose common characteristics are a desire to learn and a capacity to excel. The psychiatrist of the future must be equally adept at psychiatric differential diagnosis, medical and psychosocial treatments, health care team management, and medical economics. We continue our push to identify cutting-edge treatment approaches to persistent problems in psychiatry and commit to teaching our future clinicians the skills necessary to successfully implement these approaches. We urge you to join us in shaping the future our exciting discipline.

David J. Kupfer, M.D.
Thomas Detre Professor and Chair, Department of Psychiatry, and Professor of Neuroscience

 

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