The one-year Addiction Psychiatry Fellowship curriculum offers advanced clinical training in a variety of settings, with an emphasis on both pharmacotherapy and psychotherapy training. Fellows learn how to screen, evaluate, diagnose and manage substance use disorders and co-occurring psychiatric conditions and build a broad set of clinical skills in addiction pharmacotherapy, psychopharmacology and psychotherapy.
Curriculum Components
Didactics
Didactics are a high priority and at least three hours per week are protected educational time. Fellows are not assigned clinical responsibilities during class time and are expected to attend at least 75% of classes.
Exercises designed to build the knowledge and theoretical foundation for a deep understanding of addiction from multiple perspectives include:
- Assigned readings.
- Case presentations.
- Grand rounds.
- Journal club.
- Lectures.
- Seminars.
- Supervision.
Subject areas include:
- Clinical phenomenology.
- Management for all major substances.
- Neurobiology.
- Public health and policy.
- Research methodology.
- Special populations.
- A variety of psychotherapy and mutual help modalities, including:
- Motivational interviewing.
- Cognitive-behavioral therapy.
- Relapse prevention.
- Contingency management.
- Harm reduction.
- 12-step facilitation.
- Psychodynamics.
Clinical Rotations
Distributed over the course of 12 blocks, clinical rotations emphasize longitudinal care to provide a nuanced and deep appreciation of the course of addiction treatment. Rotations also emphasize fellows’ integration into each program’s care team to build autonomy, team leadership skills and systems-based understanding.
Integral Care (6 blocks)
- Narcotic treatment program: Primarily methadone assessment, management and psychiatric care
- Office-based opioid treatment and medication-assisted treatment: Primarily opioid maintenance assessment, management and psychiatric care
- Outpatient withdrawal clinic: Opioid and alcohol outpatient withdrawal management
- Intensive outpatient program: Matrix model individual and group psychotherapy
Austin VA Outpatient Clinic (3 blocks)
- Substance abuse treatment program outpatient clinic: Addiction pharmacotherapy assessment, management and psychiatric care
- Supportive outpatient program: Multi-phase, evidence-based individual and group psychotherapy
UT Health Austin (1/2 block)
- Outpatient addiction psychiatry consultation for primary care and specialty clinics
Dell Seton Medical Center (1/2 block)
- Consultation-liaison service: Inpatient addiction psychiatry consultation, including proactive consult service and multidisciplinary inpatient buprenorphine team
Elective, Scholarly Project or Research (2 blocks)
Clinical elective sites include Seton Mind Institute’s intensive outpatient programs and Integral Care’s residential programs and HIV harm-reduction outreach programs, as well as other affiliated institutions.
Prospective research mentors include faculty in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Waggoner Center for Alcohol and Addiction Research, Department of Neuroscience, Steve Hicks School of Social Work and College of Pharmacy. The research opportunities span areas such as neurobiology, molecular biology, genetics, neuroimaging, motivational interviewing, harm reduction, epidemiology, policy and implementation science.