Psychology Education and Training Program

Core Training Area III: Intervention and Prevention

The Amplified Musculoskeletal Pain Syndrome Program (AMPS) 

The AMPS Program consists of an interdisciplinary team including a physician, a nurse practitioner, a psychologist (psychiatrist if needed), physical therapists, occupational therapists, a music therapist, an art therapist, a school coordinator, a social worker, an aquatic specialist and support staff. We treat children and adolescents with amplified pain through intensive physical, occupational and psychological/creative arts therapy to restore function without pain medications. This is a daily program, Monday-Friday, 8 a.m. to 4 p.m., that may take from one to seven weeks (average four weeks), and can be either inpatient or outpatient, depending on the need.

Our mission is to provide a comprehensive holistic interdisciplinary team approach to the individualized treatment and care of children with Amplified Musculoskeletal Pain/RND. We uphold this mission by empowering children and their families through instilling confidence and providing hope to restore overall healthy life function.

Interns participating in the AMPS Program will provide psychological services to patients including a minimum of two sessions per week, co-treatment with PT/OT and consultation with the interdisciplinary team to inform treatment planning. Interns will also work with parents and participate in family meetings, as appropriate. Additionally, interns will have the opportunity to consult with patients’ schools and outside mental health treatment providers, as appropriate. There are also opportunities to participate in patient and parent group psychotherapy.

Training objectives

Interns are expected to attend RND rounds and patient care meetings. Specific training objectives of the rotation will be tailored to each intern’s training needs, goals and objectives.

Behavioral Health in Urban Schools Initiative

The Behavioral Health in Urban Schools Program is committed to conducting culturally relevant applied research within schools serving children of low income, and ethnic minority background who are at risk for mental health problems and underutilization of mental health services. The primary goal of the BHUS program is to reduce barriers to mental health care, with a particular focus on improving access to behavioral health services for children and families in urban school settings.

Through research grants funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the BHUS program offers free psycho-educational assessments for low income children attending public and parochial schools in Philadelphia who have problems with disruptive behavior, aggression, academic underachievement, mood problems, adjustment difficulties and other behavioral health issues. The assessments are often performed on-site at the child’s school. Bilingual, bicultural providers offer bilingual evaluations for Spanish-speaking families. Following a help-seeking behavior theoretical model, trainees collect data on factors thought to affect access to services as well as help-seeking behavior for low income and ethnic minority parents. After the assessments are conducted, families receive comprehensive treatment plans to address areas of concern. The treatment plans are customized for the specific presenting problems, family help-seeking history, and common barriers and facilitators of service use experienced by the family as indicated in the assessment.

Training objectives

Skills

Center for Management of ADHD

Referrals on behalf of children 3 to 18 years of age are accepted for intervention services. Intervention models typically entail child and family behavior therapy, parent education and training (in individual or group formats), teacher and school consultation and, when indicated, closely monitored and evaluated medication trials conducted alone or in combination with cognitive-behavioral and psychoeducational strategies. You will develop skills pertinent to developmental psychopathology, school consultation, child and family behavior therapy, home-school collaboration, psychopharmacology, and outcome assessment.

Training objectives

Group Treatment for Families

For families coping with ADHD, challenges related to treatment utilization and adherence arise for a variety of reasons, including family beliefs and stress, and limited provider availability. Group treatment formats are one method by which barriers might be reduced. Also, through group discussion and shared problem solving, parents and children derive support from others coping with ADHD, potentially increasing utilization and adherence.

The ADHD Center’s parent group treatment programs (Boot Camp, Family-School Success [FSS], and Back-to-School) are intended to support diagnosis acceptance and treatment initiation/adherence. Additionally, the groups focus on developing and maintaining strong, collaborative family-school relationships to support educational success. Group participants are parents of elementary aged children with ADHD. Also, in spite of the availability of effective parent training programs, many children with ADHD experience significant organizational skills impairments. The Time Management, Organization, Planning and Study Skills (TOPS) program is a skills-training group intervention targeting middle school students with organizational deficits. This group also helps parents and teachers support students’ implementation and practice of skills to promote generalization.

Training objectives

Intern responsibilities

School and Community Support

These programs seek to enhance the capacity of urban, under-resourced schools and communities to more proactively address problems related to aggression/social skills promotion and academic support/homework help. The School Support Program is a 20-session group intervention that is designed to help at-risk African American elementary age girls learn valuable anger management and social skills and/or homework and organizational skills. The project is funded by an NIMH R01 grant and is conducted in strong partnership with various school staff members and community residents.

The Philadelphia Collaborative Violence Prevention Center (PCVPC) is a new initiative funded by the CDC in which an intern can participate in a range of activities related to working with community members to design and implement a multi-level, multi-component aggression prevention program with 10-14 year old youth in community venues (e.g., recreation centers, after-school programs, and faith-based initiatives).

Training objectives

Child/Adolescent OCD, Tic, Trich and Anxiety Group (COTTAGe)

COTTAGe provides training in the cognitive behavioral approaches to OCD and other anxiety disorders, tics and trichotillomania in a pediatric population. The outpatient treatments include exposure and response prevention for OCD, CBT for pediatric anxiety (consistent with the Coping Cat manual), and habit reversal training for tics, trichotillomania and other body-focused repetitive behaviors. Patients are seen in an outpatient context and are largely 6-18 years old. Some adult patients may also be seen for tics and trichotillomania. There is often a heavy focus on family involvement in treatment and relapse prevention, especially for the younger patients. In addition, there is an opportunity to attend workshops presented by the clinic intended to train community clinicians on the treatments described above.

The training model consists of observation of others’ ongoing cases, watching videos of previous cases, ongoing weekly supervision, and periodic live observation by a supervisor.

Training objectives

Eating Disorders, Diagnosis and Intervention

This rotation provides training in the assessment of and intervention with children, adolescents, and families presenting with eating disorder concerns. There are two sites for the rotation:

  1. Interns will work with the adolescent medicine team on 5WMain during the acute phase of the medical intervention on Tuesday mornings. They will participate in general psychiatry consultation-liaison rounds, adolescent medicine rounds, and work with the attending psychologist during initial consultation and follow-up for hospitalized patients and their families.
  2. Interns will work with the outpatient psychiatry team on Tuesday or Wednesday afternoons (1-6 p.m.) and participate in family therapy for patients subsequently followed on an outpatient basis.

Training objectives

Expectations

Community-Based Primary Care and School Psychology

This rotation is required and restricted to interns within the Primary Care and School Psychology track. Interns will work in CHOP pediatric primary care, providing consultation and intervention services within a primary care team, including pediatrician, pediatric resident, clinical nurse practitioner, child psychologist, amongst others. The patient population is generally low income and resides in medically underserved urban communities. Interns will also provide consultation and intervention services within an urban middle school utilizing a multidisciplinary team, including child psychologist and child and adolescent psychiatry fellows. Interns will acquire skills necessary to effectively provide community-based services to underserved children and their families.

The Family Stress and Illness Program (FSIP)

The Family Stress and Illness Program provides family based outpatient services to address the psychological needs of children and families experiencing acute or chronic illnesses. The unique strengths of families are recognized through all aspects of care, in particular the essential impact families have on illness management and health outcomes. Priority is assigned to providing care for children and families who have recently experienced inpatient medical hospitalization and require ongoing psychological care to optimize healthy adjustments.

Training objectives

Gastroenterology and Nutrition

This rotation offers an opportunity to be part of an outpatient interdisciplinary team comprised of medicine, nursing, nutrition, social work and psychology. Our patient population includes children and adolescents with a range of presenting gastrointestinal conditions that include Inflammatory Bowel Disease, Functional Gastrointestinal Disorders, Eosinophilic Esophagitis, as well as Defecation Disorders.

This rotation is generally completed as a four-hour rotation. However, other arrangements may be made to accommodate needs of a particular intern’s training interests/schedule.

Training objectives

Training activities

Required training activities include:

Paperwork expectations

Plastic Surgery: Facial Reconstruction Center

Rotation description

Hours/week
Interns work 4-8 hours on Thursdays. Cleft Palate Clinic is held three times a month; Craniofacial Clinic is held on the third Thursday of each month. Each clinic day concludes with a one hour multidisciplinary team meeting.

Population
Patients (ages: birth to 21 years) with a variety of medical concerns, including:

Clinical opportunities
This is an outpatient rotation, although opportunities for inpatient consultation may be available (e.g., when patients are hospitalized for surgical procedures). Common referrals include:

Interns who elect to complete this rotation will participate in the following activities:

Research opportunities
Opportunities to participate in several ongoing research projects are available.

Responsibilities
Interns will be responsible for writing consultation notes, initial evaluations, and progress notes. Consultation and progress notes should be completed on the day of the patient visit. Initial evaluations (including treatment plan) should be completed within three sessions. Samples of consultation notes, initial evaluations, and progress notes will be provided. 

The Safe Place Treatment and Support Program

Nancy Braveman, MS, PsyD, Teresa Brieck, MSS, LCSW

The Safe Place Treatment and Support Program offers psychosocial support services and mental health treatment to children and families where there is suspected or known sexual abuse. The program typically treats children from 2 to 14 years of age who have been seen at CARE Clinic for a specialized medical exam and treatment related to concerns of sexual abuse. Interns would work as part of an outpatient team that includes medicine, social work and psychology. The rotation is offered for 8-10 hours per week.

Training objectives

 

  • Print
  • Share

Contact Us