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Department of Psychiatry Department of Psychiatry
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Psychotherapy Training

"In my early professional years I was asking the question: How can I treat, or cure, or change this person? Now I would phrase the question in this way: How can I provide a relationship which this person may use for his own personal growth?"

― Carl R. Rogers

"It is far more important to know what person the disease has than what disease the person has."

― Hippocrates

At the UC San Diego Psychiatry Residency Program we believe that a deep understanding and appreciation of psychotherapy is critical to the sophisticated practice of psychiatry and thus is a vital component of the identity of psychiatrists. We understand that some residents may wish to focus their future practices on psychopharmacology and/or interventional psychiatry whereas others may aspire to make psychotherapy an integral part of their work. We wholeheartedly support whichever path residents choose to take. Regardless, a strong psychotherapy foundation is essential to psychiatric practice no matter the focus.

Our Aims

Our aims are for all psychiatry residents to develop competency in practicing psychotherapy, make nuanced and appropriate referrals for psychotherapy, and integrate psychotherapeutic processes and theories into case conceptualizations and clinical care in order to optimize patient outcomes. We provide many specialized psychotherapy electives for residents who are interested in further exploring psychotherapy and who may be considering a psychotherapy practice after graduation.

We achieve our aims through:

1) psychotherapy didactics which arc over all four years of training,
2) individual psychotherapy supervision,
3) experiential clinical psychotherapy opportunities

Each of these core components of psychotherapy training are delineated below.

Psychotherapy Didactics

Seminars and didactics on psychotherapy run throughout all four years of residency training. In fact, psychotherapy is the largest thread in the residency formalized curriculum. Additional psychotherapy themed sessions occur in the Resident Rounds series, a series which is attended by psychiatry residents in all years of training. Seminar and didactic topics include, but are not limited to:

  • Motivational Interviewing (MI)
  • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Didactic Series
  • Specialized forms of CBT, including CBT for Insomnia (CBT-I), CBT for Psychosis, Cognitive Behavioral Social Skills Training (CBSST) for serious mental illness (SMI), and Exposure and Response Prevention (ERP) for obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD)
  • Trauma-Focused Therapies, including Prolonged Exposure (PE) and Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT)
  • Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) Didactic Series
  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) Didactic Series
  • Mindfulness-Based Therapies
  • Psychodynamic Psychotherapy Didactic Series
  • Interpersonal Therapy
  • Family and Couples Psychotherapy
  • Integration of Psychotherapy and Pharmacotherapy

UC San Diego partners with the San Diego Psychoanalytic Center (SDPC) to offer a year-long elective course in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy that meets weekly for four hours. Residents can participate in this elective course during their PGY3 or PGY4 year. The elective course in psychodynamic psychotherapy is designed to expose residents to contemporary psychodynamic practice, empirical evidence of the psychodynamic approach, psychodynamic case conceptualization, theories of therapeutic action in psychodynamic therapy, and psychodynamic formulations in pharmacological treatment. The elective course in Psychodynamic Psychotherapy includes a weekly psychodynamic seminar, weekly psychodynamic case conference/group supervision, and weekly individual supervision.

Psychotherapy Supervision

A key component of psychotherapy training in residency is learning from psychotherapy supervision. Residents are paired with individual psychotherapy supervisors to discuss their psychotherapy cases and learn from their supervisors' clinical insights and depth of clinical experience. They work with each supervisor on a weekly basis.

Each resident is paired with a CBT supervisor during their PGY2 and PGY3 years, with many residents electing to continue CBT supervision during their PGY4 year. During PGY3 and PGY4 years, the CBT supervisor may also offer opportunities for residents to receive supervision in other modalities of psychotherapy, such as Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), and other specialized forms of CBT. Many PGY3 and PGY4 elective clinics also provide opportunities for residents to receive additional training in various psychotherapy modalities.

Residents who participate in the year-long Psychodynamic Elective during PGY3 or PGY4 will also be paired with a psychodynamic psychotherapy supervisor from the San Diego Psychoanalytic Center (SDPC).

Psychotherapy Clinical Cases

Our best teachers are our patients. This is especially the case with psychotherapy education. As such, the clinical experiential aspects of psychotherapy training are critical components of the residency psychotherapy education. Residents receive supervised training in the clinical application of various psychotherapies in PGY2-PGY4 years:

  • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT): CBT cases and supervision in PGY2 and PGY3 years, with optional training in the PGY4 year
  • Psychodynamic Psychotherapy: elective course, which involves seeing psychodynamic cases and receiving supervision, in PGY3 or PGY4

Additional clinical experiences with psychotherapy occur during elective half-day weekly clinics during the PGY3 and PGY4 years. These elective choices comprise of longitudinal patient care combined with individual psychotherapy supervision, include:

  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
  • Couples Therapy
  • Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT) and Prolonged Exposure (PE) therapy through PTSD Clinic Elective
  • Motivational Interviewing through Substance Use Clinic elective

Clinical experience with group therapy occurs in select PGY3 and PGY4 elective clinic opportunities. Examples include:

  • Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) Groups
  • Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT) Skills Groups
  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) Groups