Internship in Professional Psychology

The Friends Hospital Internship Program in Professional Psychology provides an opportunity for doctoral candidates in clinical or counseling psychology to work under close supervision in a professional setting committed to the principles of humane and moral treatment and high quality service. The internship program employs a Practitioner-Scholar-Healthcare Administrative and Entrepreneurial training model. The training menu includes a wide range of specialty clinical rotations; group psychotherapy; brief individual psychotherapy; opportunities to learn clinical supervision; psychological assessment; a multi-disciplined treatment milieu; and a racially, ethnically, and culturally diverse patient population. Additionally, interns gain in-depth knowledge of different models of healthcare financing and administration; various models of psychological service delivery; managed care; quality improvement programs and outcomes measurement; practice management and professional practice issues. Interns are strongly encouraged to develop practitioner/scholar as well as administrative and entrepreneurial skills, thereby enhancing their capacity for successful innovation in response to a rapidly changing marketplace.

The internship seeks to develop competencies in eight areas of professional practice. These are outlined below. Further elaboration of the program’s goals and objectives may be found in the Internship Handbook.

Competency 1: Interns will become skilled in consultation, evaluation and psycho-diagnostic assessment and report writing that sheds light on functional and dysfunctional patterns of social, cognitive, emotional and behavioral responses, elucidates those factors which give rise to and maintain these responses, and which presents reasonable recommendations for remediation and treatment.

Competency 2: Interns will demonstrate competence in providing case management and clinical services including crisis intervention, individual, family and group psychotherapy and will show awareness of and sensitivity to issues of individual differences and human diversity as they relate to these therapeutic activities.

Competency 3: Interns will demonstrate sensitivity to, and knowledge and understanding of issues of individual differences and human diversity as they impact on the assessment/evaluation, intervention, consultation and administrative functions of psychologists.

Competency 4: Interns will demonstrate basic knowledge and understanding of the clinical, legal, ethical and administrative aspects of supervision and will demonstrate rudimentary skill and proficiency in the provision of supervisory services

Competency 5: Interns will acquire a solid working knowledge and understanding of a wide range of ethical, legal and professional practice issues; the APA’s (2002)Ethical Principals of Psychologists and Code of Conduct; the APA’s (1987)General Guidelines for Providers of Psychological Services; APA Minority Affair’s (1993) Guidelines for Providers of Psychological Services to Ethnic, Linguistic, and Culturally Diverse Populations and the Pennsylvania Code(1994)Chapter 41Bylaws of the Pennsylvania State Board of Psychology. Specifically, interns will display competency in:

• their understanding of what constitutes a medical record and in their acquisition of sound record keeping practices
• their understanding of legal and ethical issues as they relate to confidentiality and third party requests for records (including written requests, court orders and subpoenas)
• their understanding of the notion of ‘privilege’
• their ability to describe legal and ethical principals as they relate to the independent practice of psychology
• their ability to explain the ethical and legal principal of informed consent
• their understanding of the functions of the state licensing boards
• their working knowledge and understanding of duty to protect by warning doctrine
• their working knowledge and understanding of doctrine relevant to the treatment of minors
• their familiarity with ethical and legal issues pertaining to reports of false memories, sexual and non-sexual boundary violations, PA-child protective services laws, older adult abuse and child custody evaluations

Competency 6: Interns will use their knowledge and understanding of research design, sound scientific methodology and individual differences and human diversity to assess the psychological literature for valid, reliable, and clinically meaningful information-- then use this information in a way so as to improve treatment outcomes and other performance indicators.

Competency 7: Interns will internalize a set of professional psychological values, which they will strive to uphold for the duration of their professional careers. This set of values includes:

• the importance of developing a suitable professional identity which includes the abilities and initiative necessary for active participation in the field
• the importance of continuous quality assessment and improvement activities
• the need for accountability, empirically validated treatments and the measurement of outcomes
• the importance of scientifically based evidence and scholarly inquiry
• the necessity of continuing education

Competency 8: Interns will display a basic understanding and working knowledge of:

• different models of healthcare financing and administration including indemnity, preferred provider organizations, and managed care plans
• the notion of risk, risk contracting and capitation, including the pros and cons of ‘carved out’ behavioral healthcare
• a number of different mental health services delivery models including integrated delivery systems, vertically and horizontally integrated practice models, disease management programs, the integration of psychological care with primary medical care and behavioral medicine
• provider networks, credentialling and accrediting organizations (JCAHO, NCQA, HEDIS, DPW)
• level of care determinations and their relationship to severity of illness, utilization and care management
• basic leadership and management skill
• the importance of an entrepreneurial spirit and, with experience, develop the skills and confidence necessary to successfully innovate both clinically and administratively.
• disease management protocols and best practices and will maintain the knowledge and skills to use them when they are indicated.
• federal, state and local/institutional regulations governing medical record documentation and retention.
• the clinical and ethical challenges presented by managed care and other third-party insurance payers and of strategies to handle these challenges or how to ‘manage’ managed care.
• how to design, develop, maintain and productively use continuous quality improvement programs (CQI) and understand the importance of integrating them into administrative infrastructure.
• the professional literature on measuring treatment outcomes and patient satisfaction as well as with a number of the more commonly used psychometric instruments designed for this purpose.
• basic marketing practices and professional practice development strategies and will have the ability to assess basic market needs and trends.
• insurance reimbursement, billing and procedure coding.
• professional malpractice insurance, including terms and conditions of coverage

The Friends Hospital Internship in Professional Psychology has full accreditation by the American Psychological Association (Committee on Accreditation, Phone: 202-336-5979).

About Friends Hospital

Friends Hospital, founded in 1813 as America’s first private, psychiatric hospital, today provides a range of vertically integrated therapeutic services. Friends Hospital was originally patterned after The Retreat, a Quaker asylum founded in York, England during the 18th century. The hospital is located in Northeast Philadelphia on a beautiful 100-acre campus whose spectacular gardens have been described in horticulture magazines.

The patient population consists of older adults, adults, adolescents and children at the residential, inpatient and outpatient (EAP) levels of care. The hospital has a 192-bed inpatient capacity. Among our specialty programs are:

• Greystone and Hillside residential programs
• Geriatric psychiatry
• Eating disorders unit
• Adolescent unit
• Women’s unit
• Intensive Adult unit
• General adult units
• MH/SA dual diagnosis tracts
• The Friends Hospital Crisis Response Center, a 24-hour/ 7-day psychiatric emergency center

 A broad cross-section of diagnoses are represented among our patient populations with affective, behavioral and psychotic disorders being the modal diagnoses for inpatient patients, and affective and anxiety disorders for outpatients. Patients are admitted without regard to sex, creed, sexual preference or race. The majority of patients pay for their hospitalization through third party payers, including Blue Cross, Medicare, Medicaid, US Healthcare, Keystone HMO, and many other indemnity and managed care plans.

Treatment

Multidisciplinary teams of professionals who apply a comprehensive case management approach provide treatment at Friends Hospital. This approach relies on cognitive-behavioral, interpersonal, psychodynamic, family systems, and psychobiological theories of human behavior and psychopathology.  Medication, group and family psychotherapy, individual therapy, activity therapies, and milieu therapies are employed.

Commitment to Training

Friends Hospital serves as a training site for psychiatric residents, medical students, nursing students, social work interns, art/activity therapy students, behavioral health externs and doctoral level psychology interns. The Drexel University College of Medicine Department of Psychiatry is housed on our main campus and has a clinical partnership agreement with Friends Hospital.

The psychology interns provide ambulatory services to the community, serving patients from diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds through an EAP program. Through these activities, interns also gain knowledge of healthcare financing, administration and psychological service delivery.

A wide variety of educational seminars, workshops, case conferences and CE activities are available to all students in residence as well as the hospital community. Full time unlimited Internet access is provided through individual personal computers for each intern.

Friends Hospital is accredited by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations and is licensed by the Pennsylvania Department of Public Welfare. The Friends Hospital Internship Program in Professional Psychology is a member in good standing of the Association of Psychology Pre-Doctoral and Post-Doctoral Internship Centers (APPIC).

Clinical Activities

Therapeutic Intervention

Group psychotherapy is an extensively used modality in the internship’s clinical rotation areas. Interns provide group therapy for diverse patient populations and employ a variety of group therapy approaches.

Individual psychotherapy is provided to inpatients as indicated, usually within the specialization area in which the intern is currently working. Cognitive-behavioral and other brief approaches are most frequently used. Outpatient individual psychotherapy is provided on the hospital grounds and all interns carry an outpatient caseload throughout the training year as part of the EAP that is managed by the interns.

Supervision. Senior level psychologists individually supervise all interns. The therapeutic orientations of psychology supervisors represent cognitive-behavioral and behavior therapy, self-psychology, systems theory and psychoanalytically oriented psychotherapy. Interns experience a range of supervisory styles and orientations.   In addition to two hours each of weekly individual and group supervision, additional supervision occurs during unit team meetings with other professionals and in case presentation seminars.

Psycho-diagnostic assessment.  Objective and projective personality testing, along with intellectual and neuropsychological evaluations provide diagnostic and treatment planning information for those patients who present some difficulty in diagnosis or treatment course. Interns receive individual supervision in administration, interpretation, and report writing for psychological test batteries. This supervision is in addition to the individual and group supervision provided.

Consultation. Psychologists work with other clinical staff in the hospital to aid them in the treatment of patients. Each intern becomes a member of a unit team, takes part in treatment coordinating conferences, and attends community meetings. As members of their team, interns gain experience as consultants working with a variety of professionals including psychiatrists, social workers, care and rehabilitative therapy coordinators, psychiatric nurses and certified addictions counselors. A consultation-liaison model is used for all hospital requests for psycho-diagnostic assessments.

Externship in Behavioral Healthcare. An Externship program in behavioral healthcare was launched in September of 2002 for pre-internship level doctoral students. This program is administered by the department of Education and Training and clinically supervised by the interns and psychology faculty. This affords the interns the opportunity to learn and perform program administration and development as well as clinical supervision.

Administrative Experience.  Interns are given the opportunity to participate in hospital wide committees with senior psychologists.  These committees include Ethics, Clinical Operations, Clinical Leadership and various task force committees. 

Educational Opportunities

A variety of educational opportunities are provided to interns. A formal seminar and lecture series is part of the internship program and offers a minimum of two hours of didactic and clinical presentations per week. Internship seminars and their frequency of occurrence are fixed, their content however, can vary. Examples include:

• An assessment seminar addresses intellectual, personality and neuropsychological testing and report writing.
• A cognitive-behavior therapy seminar focuses on how individual therapy interventions for various disorders are approached from this perspective.
• A case presentation seminar discusses individual therapy cases from a variety of theoretical and treatment perspectives.
• Professional practice seminars present special topics of professional interest including cultural diversity issues, ethical and professional practice issues, confidentiality and mental health law and medical ethics.
• Mental health services administration seminars provide an opportunity for the intern to learn about cutting edge administrative issues including: the role of accrediting organizations (JCAHO & NCQA); quality improvement; utilization management; performance improvement; innovative service delivery systems; assessment of market needs; capitation; marketing of behavioral health services; working on a multidisciplinary team; the integration of behavioral and primary medical care; provider networks; and the assessment and use of consumer satisfaction and clinical outcome measures for service improvement.
• A guest lecturer series brings in multidisciplinary staff from around the hospital and the local psychiatric and psychological community to lecture on various aspects of psychopathology and treatment. Past topics have included: psychopharmacology, mental retardation, geriatric and child psychiatry, chemical dependency and addiction, eating disorders, organic brain syndromes, trauma, couples and family therapy, behavioral medicine, emergency psychiatry, schizophrenia, dissociative identity disorder, resilience, working with sex offenders and the psychologist as CEO.
• A variety of formal lectures are presented throughout the year on topics related to Cultural/ Individual Differences and Diversity. These are presented by hospital professional staff as well as outside guest lecturers.

From time to time, interns have the option of conducting brief administrative/research projects individually or in small groups under the direction of a supervising psychologist or other licensed healthcare professional. These opportunities have included: numerous special projects involving psychological consultation to the hospital’s administration, marketing and business development departments, program development, treatment efficacy studies and psychotherapy outcomes measurement.  Research is not currently being conducted in the hospital.

Throughout the training year, the internship’s self-study reading program continuously circulates contemporary readings in clinical psychology and behavioral healthcare; healthcare administration/financing; psychological service delivery; practice management; professional ethics and mental health law. These readings come from professional journals, books, newspapers and other forms of media selected by the Training Director and psychology staff.  These articles often form the basis of many lively discussions between staff and interns and are chosen to represent a diverse range of topics.

Current Clinical Services

Interns may serve in up to four different clinical service areas throughout the year. Each service rotation lasts either three or six months. In each clinical service, the intern is called upon to participate in treatment planning with staff and patients, to conduct group therapy as therapist and co-therapist with other clinical staff, and to provide individual therapy and psychological assessment when the treatment team deems appropriate. In each of the clinical units, the intern is an important member of the interdisciplinary team, which delivers care on that service. The training sites available to interns may change from time-to-time due to fluctuation in which areas in our system might provide the best educational and supervisory experiences. Possible options for clinical rotations are as follows [see ‘Handbook’ for greater detail]:

• In the General Adult Programs (3 months), interns provide psychological and psychodiagnostic assessments, conduct group, family and individual therapy, attend community meetings, treatment team meetings and participate in the unit’s other daily activities.  Units may employ a CBT treatment regime. There is a pain management component on one unit.  All General Adult units have a Dual Diagnosis/Substance Abuse tract.

• In the Older Adult Program  (3 months), interns provide psychological and psychodiagnostic assessments, conduct group, family and individual therapy, attend community meetings, treatment team meetings and participate in the unit’s other daily activities with a population of adults over 55.  Consideration is given to the impact of physical health concerns on mental health.

• In the Eating Disorders Program (3 months), interns participate in treatment planning, conduct group therapy, individual therapy, perform psychological assessments and case management. The intern runs both a process group and a cognitive-behavioral group in this service. This service provides a structured inpatient program to both male and female patients.

• In the Adolescent Program (3 months), interns participate in treatment planning, community meetings, conduct group and individual therapy and perform psychological assessments. The unit provides inpatient behavioral interventions.

• In the Women’s Service interns currently participate in treatment planning, provide consultation, individual psychotherapy,  psychodiagnostic testing and assessment services. Further intern involvement is currently under development.

• In the Dual Diagnosis Tracts, designed for adults with comorbid mental health and substance abuse diagnoses, the interns provide psychological and psychodiagnostic assessments, conduct group therapy and individual therapy.

• In the Outpatient Service* (6 months), interns are responsible for triage and intake functions, crisis intervention, individual, family and couples psychotherapy. All ages and diagnoses are represented. Additionally, interns are afforded the opportunity to learn how to deliver effective therapeutic interventions under an Employee Assistance Program model.  *[see the Internship Handbook for important additional information on the outpatient rotation]  When on the Outpatient service, the intern is also placed half-time on an inpatient unit.

In addition to their primary rotations, all interns provide additional psychological consultation and liaison, psychological assessment and direct clinical services throughout the hospital system during the training year. Each year, interns participate in unique clinical and administrative training opportunities, as they become available. New training experiences are always being explored and developed. Due to the rapidly changing nature of the mental healthcare landscape and marketplace, these opportunities may change.

Year long responsibilities for all interns include psychodiagnostic testing, a caseload of 3 to 6 EAP cases, development of behavior management programs, supervision of externs and consultation/liaison to units without psychology staff. 

Application Process

Requirements

The internship is open to qualified students who have completed their formal course work in a doctoral program in clinical or counseling psychology. Evidence of supervised training and course work in cultural diversity/individual differences, professional ethics, abnormal psychology, research and statistical methods, psycho-diagnostic assessment techniques, and individual, family and group interventions is required. A minimum of 650 supervised practicum hours is required. Experience and/or knowledge in healthcare administration/financing, psychological service delivery, managed care and professional practice issues are desirable but not required.

Application Materials

An up-to-date Curriculum Vitae, three letters of reference, graduate course transcripts, a cover letter (including a very concise statement of your reasons for making application to Friends Hospital), one sample test report utilizing projectives, "readiness and eligibility letter", and the completed APPIC application (AAPI) are required. The APPIC application may be obtained from their web page at www.appic.org. For selected applicants, a personal interview will be requested later in the application process.

Apply to:

Paula Humphries, Psy.D.
Director of Psychology
Friends Hospital
4641 Roosevelt Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19124-2399

Timelines

Submit applications by: 5pm, EST., Friday November 14, 2008

Interviews: Mid-December through January.

The Friends Hospital Internship in Clinical Psychology participates in APPIC’s Internship Match Program (see APPIC statement below). All applicants must register with National Matching Services, Inc. for the Matching Program in order to be eligible to match to this internship program. Further information on NMS may be obtained from their web site at: www.natmatch.com/psychint.

Notification

The computer match results will be released in February, 2009, at which time matched applicants will be called personally to confirm the appointment. A formal written confirmation letter will be sent at a later date with a copy to the applicant’s department chairperson.

APPIC Regulations and Policies

The internship program at Friends Hospital abides fully with all APPIC match policies. The 2008-2009 APPIC policy statement regarding the Matching Program may be viewed at the APPIC web site at: http://www.appic.org/.

This internship site agrees to abide by the APPIC policy that no person at this training facility will solicit, accept or use any ranking-related information from any intern applicant.

Compensation

Compensation for those applicants accepted into the program is a yearly salary in the amount of $22,568.00.  All interns are afforded the same benefits as other Friends Health System employees which currently includes ten vacation days, six holidays, six sick days, one personal day, and other fringe benefits such as free parking.  Health insurance including dental and vision plans will be provided.

Friends Hospital
4641 Roosevelt Boulevard
Philadelphia, PA 19124-2399

Department of Psychology: (215) 831-4057;
Hospital Switchboard: (215) 831-4600;
Fax: (215) 831-4563

The American Psychological Association, 750 First Street, NE, Washington, D.C. 20002-4242
Committee on Accreditation Phone: 202 336 5979

 

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Revised: July 03, 2008