Career Development - Psychiatry

Psychiatry residency is four years long. The intern year is spent in Internal Medicine, Neurology and Acute (Inpatient) Psychiatry. The following three years consist of multiple rotations, including child and adolescent psychiatry, consult liaison psychiatry, addiction psychiatry, geriatric psychiatry, outpatient psychiatry, and training in psychotherapy. Psychotherapy training is longitudinal, and residents are required to have cases in a multitude of different psychotherapy modalities.

There are also combined degree programs. Triple Board (Adult Psychiatry, Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, and Pediatrics) is 5 years long. Med-Psych (Adult Psychiatry and Internal Medicine) is 5 years long. There is no additional training required beyond these residencies, but there are several boarded fellowships available.

It is sometimes possible to combine Psychiatry residency with Child and Adolescent Psychiatry fellowship by applying for fellowship to start after the PGY3 year. This reduces a year off the training time for a total of 5 years instead of 6 years.

There are multiple boarded fellowships: Child and Adolescent Psychiatry (2 years), Geriatric Psychiatry (1 year), Forensic Psychiatry (1 year), Addiction Psychiatry (1 year), and Psychosomatic Medicine (1 year), Hospice and Palliative Medicine, Sleep Medicine, and Pain Management. There are also non-boarded fellowships/trainings in many areas including, but not limited to, Perinatal Psychiatry, Infant Mental Health, Eating Disorders, HIV Psychiatry, Integrative Medicine, Research, Schizophrenia, Community Psychiatry, Electroconvulsive Therapy, and other minimally invasive procedures.

Qualities recognized as important to psychiatry include:

• The ability to listen “actively” and observe “comprehensively.”
• Psychological mindedness and curiosity.
• The ability to skillfully engage and develop therapeutic alliance with patients from the first encounter.
• Compassion and empathy, but pragmatic firmness about boundaries.
• Nonjudgmental stance and cognizance of one’s own limitations.
• Impeccable integrity and ethical conduct.

There are multiple areas of research occurring within the Department of Psychiatry including:

• Infant Mental Health – the effects from neglect and deprivation
• Collaborative care models
• Genetics – the effects on DNA from stress and trauma
• Schizophrenia and outcomes with first-episode psychosis intervention
• PTSD in children and the best treatment modalities
• PTSD and family therapy

There is a research webpage where details can be accessed.

Additionally, students may want to pursue research opportunities through the DeBakey Scholars Program. This program offers medical students the opportunity to pursue and complete a longitudinal, structured, closely supervised research experience culminating in a capstone presentation prior to graduation. For more information, contact Dr. Derek Pociask. 

Mentorship: Residents in Tulane’s Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences are paired with students based on common interests. Both adult psychiatry and child and adolescent psychiatry residents have offered to mentor students.

Education: We hold three lunch presentations throughout the year, which bring in speakers to discuss a range of mental health topics. We also sponsor medical student attendance at Tulane's Brain and Behavior Conference in December and Forensic Psychiatry Conference in April, including a special lunch with faculty.

Service: This varies year to year. In the recent past students have volunteered at the Sensory Friendly Family Night at the Louisiana Children’s Museum, a time when the museum is opened just for children with Autism Spectrum Disorders and their families so they can enjoy the museum after hours.

Dr. Ashley Weiss -- Director of Medical Student Education

Dr. Erin Stanton

Dr. Michael Romanelli

Dr. Rachel Hammer - Med/Psych

Dr. Myo Myint - Triple Board

Sample-T4-PYCH-Schedule.pdf

If there is anything on your application that may raise concerns, please strongly consider dual applying with another specialty. You’re advised to discuss dual application options and plans with Dr. Katrina D’Aquin and your specialty advisor.

Away rotations are not necessary, but if interested in a specific program, are a good way to make yourself known. If you are interested in a program in which you have a connection (i.e., you went to undergrad there and want to move back), you should convey that to the program.

Students should look for programs they feel are a good fit in terms of size, program strengths coinciding with student interests, and “personality” of the program as a whole.

Personal statements are fairly important in this field and should clearly address why one is pursuing psychiatry. Letters of recommendation, even the ones NOT from psychiatrists, should convey the qualities about the student that are consistent with success as a psychiatrist. Always ask people writing letters to highlight your interpersonal skills.

Always reach out to programs you are truly interested in if you haven’t heard from them within a month after residency applications.

AAMC Careers in Medicine

NRMP's Charting Outcomes in the Match 2026

NRMP's Program Director Survey 2024

Applying to the Psychiatry Match by AACAP

American Psychiatric Association student resource website

American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry student resource website

Tulane’s Department of Psychiatry

Dr. Katrina D’Aquin can put you in touch with potential mentors.

Books

Reading books based on first-hand experiences with mental illnesses can be very powerful and fascinating. They do not serve to educate about pathology, but to give a window into a person’s experience of pathology. Dr. Weiss’s top three recommendations:

• An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness by Kay Redfield Jamison
• Brain on Fire: My Month of Madness by Susannah Calahan
• The Center Cannot Hold: My Journey through Madness by Elyn R. Saks