Medical Student Education Program
Considering a Career in Psychiatry?
Psychiatrists are physicians who are specialists in the diagnosis and treatment of mental disorders. Mental disorders range vastly from the very severe and life-threatening to the mild and self-limiting.
Though psychiatry is one of the oldest medical specialties, it is also one of the frontier disciplines in medicine.
Recent advances in the neurosciences have led to promising new technologies in the diagnosis and treatment of many psychiatric disorders.
Psychiatry is the fourth largest specialty with more than 45,000 psychiatrists in the United States.
Most psychiatrists spend the majority of their time seeing patients in the outpatient setting. Psychiatrists also take care of patients in the hospital, partial hospital, and residential settings.
Like other physicians, psychiatrists may work in an employed or self-employed capacity. If employed, they may work for medical schools, healthcare organizations, or governmental agencies (e.g., Veterans Administration, state hospitals, and community mental health centers). If self-employed, they may work in solo practice or in group practices.
Check out , the Psychiatry Student Interest Group Network.
Program Director Message
Psychiatry is a spectacularly interesting field of medicine, filled with promise and challenge. It is the privilege of the department’s faculty, post-graduate trainees, and staff to introduce medical students to this discipline.
Medical students will have required coursework in their M1 and M2 years and a required clinical clerkship in their M3 year. For those interested students, more advanced clinical opportunities are available in the M4 year in the form of sub-internships and elective experiences.
Marika I. Wrzosek, MD
Associate Professor
Director, Medical Student Education Program