Salt in the soul, steel in the eye and caution towards the winds: a mariner’s guide for navigating a new academic psychiatry department

Abstract

Perspicacious leadership and organisation are the foundation for an academic psychiatry department which delivers teaching, research and broader intellectual engagement with the medical and broader community.

The vacant chair: headless psychiatry departments in the Group of Eight universities of Australia

“…Public sector clinical colleagues, dedicated to their Sisyphean toils, often ask for whom the academic bell tolls and of what tolling signifies. Foremost, the teaching and development of basic psychiatric skills for medical practitioners is essential, 3 if not more so, as public mental health services struggle with psychiatric/general workforce capacity and infrastructure. To advance improved clinical skills requires specialised scholarship in education and in the arts and sciences fundamental to psychiatry, otherwise clinical skills and practice become obsolete.…”

“…Generally heads of academic psychiatry are appointed jointly by public mental health services and research-intensive universities. 3 The main contributor of funding will generally drive the job description and, as such, it is understandable that mental health services will prefer a highly skilled clinician while the universities prefer a research doyen. Public mental health services often pay a clinical loading and, accordingly, expect a significant amount of clinical service, while the university will expect the appointee to lead teaching, research and broader community service as well as contribute to university administration.…”

“…Public mental health services often pay a clinical loading and, accordingly, expect a significant amount of clinical service, while the university will expect the appointee to lead teaching, research and broader community service as well as contribute to university administration. 3 This creates a significant tension between clinical service workload and academia.…”

Flattening the curve of COVID-19 for medical education in psychiatry and addiction medicine

“…Territory (ACT). 1 Within the ACT, the ANU main campus shifted to remote work and study on 26 March 2020. Simultaneously, ANU medical students were temporarily excluded from Territory Health Services campuses.…”

“…We describe the medical educational response to COVID-19 for psychiatry and addiction medicine teaching in the fourth year of the graduate doctor of medicine and surgery degree at the Australian National University (ANU) Medical School, Australian Capital Territory (ACT). 1 Within the ACT, the ANU main campus shifted to remote work and study on 26 March 2020. Simultaneously, ANU medical students were temporarily excluded from Territory Health Services campuses.…”