Annual Meeting Offers Sessions for Residents

APA’s annual meeting is scheduled for May 5 to 10, and I wanted to give a “heads-up” about events for residents and medical students. These events are a great way to meet other trainees, learn more about the profession and organized psychiatry, meet leaders in the field, and, of course, have fun!

For those of you who have never attended an annual meeting, an orientation session called “How to Survive the Annual Meeting” will be held on Sunday, May 6, from 10 a.m. to noon. You’ll learn how to navigate through the program book and all the other paper you get at registration. You’ll get some hot tips from presenters about sessions that are likely to be especially good. It’s also a great place to ask all sorts of practical questions.

People looking for mentors should check out the breakfast on Monday, May 7, at 7 a.m. called “Meet the Experts: Sunny Side Up.” Tables will be set up in a large dining room by areas of interest; for example, child psychiatry, research, psychotherapy, and so on. You can sit down and introduce yourself to experts in the specialties you would like to explore, exchange e-mail addresses, and get some practical advice on how to pursue a career in that area.

A number of discussions and workshops will focus on resident issues. Avram Mack, M.D., the member-in-training trustee-elect, will chair two summits. The first, “Understanding the RRC Requirements,” will be held Monday, May 7, at 5 p.m. It will consist of a panel presentation and discussion from those involved in framing the new training requirements involving competency criteria that I wrote about in the December 15, 2000, issue. The second, “Does the Mind Meet Brain in Residency?,” will be held Tuesday, May 8, at 9 a.m. It features such luminaries as Stuart Yudofsky, M.D., and James Strain, M.D., and looks at how and how well mind and brain (not to mention body) are integrated in psychiatry training.

Resident groups are also sponsoring a wide variety of workshops on fascinating topics. The APA/GlaxoWellcome fellows will present “The Interpretation of Dreams: Fantasy and Reality in Residency Training” on Monday, May 7, at 9 a.m. The Committee on Residents and Fellows will present “Stalking: The Psychiatric Trainee at Risk” on Tuesday, May 8, at 9 a.m. For those interested in cross-cultural and minority issues, the APA/CMHS Fellows and APA/AstraZeneca Fellows will look at suicide in their workshop “The Color of Death: Suicide and Its Myths in Special Populations.” It also will be held Tuesday, May 8, at 9 a.m.

The annual meeting is a wonderful opportunity for residents to hear about various career opportunities within psychiatry, and I encourage you to think about attending one of these discussions. The APA Assembly Committee of Area MIT Representatives, for example, will be sponsoring the workshop “Career Choices in Psychiatry” on Wednesday, May 9, at 11:30 a.m. Ann Norwood, M.D., will talk about her work as a military psychiatrist on Monday, May 7, at 9 a.m., and Catherine Crone, M.D., will discuss her experience in consultation-liaison psychiatry on Tuesday, May 8, at 9 a.m. Some of these sessions may be of particular interest to women. For example, Vivien Burt, M.D., will discuss career opportunities in women’s mental health on Wednesday, May 9, at 9 a.m., and other workshops will look at issues such as balancing career and family.

Anybody getting ready to take the boards may want to attend the special board review course on Saturday, May 5, from 8:30 am to 5:30 p.m. titled “Board Review: Passing the Orals.” Information on registration and fees is posted on APA’s Web site at www.psych.org and on page 17. Another session will review the “Requirements for ABPN Examination,” also known as “the boards,” on Monday, May 7, at 9 a.m.

Finally, the having-fun part: Don’t miss out on the many opportunities to eat and to socialize. This year the APA resident and early-career psychiatrist leaders will be hosting a hospitality suite each evening for a couple of hours. The idea is for medical students, trainees, and those just out of training to have a place to hang out and have an opportunity for peer mentoring. Watch here for information regarding time and place. On Tuesday, May 8, at noon there will be a free lunch for residents, medical students, and training directors when the Nancy Roeske teaching awards will be presented to winning training directors. Most universities also sponsor receptions for their trainees and alumni. I encourage you to ask your training director for more details.

This is just a sampling of the enormous array of presentations and events that residents might find interesting. I certainly hope you will join us.