The American Psychological Association’s Board of Educational Affairs has named the Department of Clinical and Health Psychology as the graduate program recipient of the Award to Advance Interdisciplinary Education and Training in Psychology. This award recognizes education and training programs in psychology that advance interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, or interprofessional teaching, research or practice in psychology. This recognition includes a $3000 award to the department.
“We are very pleased with this prestigious award that highlights and acknowledges on a national level our coordination of didactic and clinical training activities, long history of extramurally-funded research and scholarly productivity, and day-to-day clinical service responsibilities,” said William Latimer, Ph.D., M.P.H., chair of the department and Elizabeth Faulk Professor. “Each of these activities involves multidisciplinary relationships across multiple specialties, including public health, dentistry, nursing, medicine and speech pathology, among others.”
Ronald Rozensky, Ph.D., a professor of clinical and health psychology, spearheaded the department’s application for the APA honor, which comes with a $3,000 award to the department.
The department of clinical and health psychology is home to a Ph.D. program in clinical psychology and a pre-doctoral internship. Students and interns have several opportunities to learn about different health professions and work with trainees from other UF colleges. In keeping with the college’s mission of collaboration between health professions and public health disciplines, all clinical psychology students take two public health classes. Several students have also decided to pursue a UF certificate or master’s degree in public health.
Each first-year graduate student enrolls in the Interdisciplinary Family Health course, along with students from Nursing, Medicine, Pharmacy and other programs in the College of Public Health and Health Professions. Students in the course receive collaborative training and work in multidisciplinary teams to conduct home visits with volunteer families in the community.
Faculty research in the department also takes a team-based approach. Of the 20 grants on which department faculty members serve as principal investigators, 70 percent involve faculty from other UF colleges and disciplines within the College of Public Health and Health Professions. The department is also affiliated with eight interdisciplinary centers of excellence.
In addition to its own psychology clinics, the department has a strong clinical presence throughout the UF&Shands Health System, collaborating with clinicians in anesthesiology, childhood HIV, geriatrics, movement disorders, orthopedic trauma, pain, pediatric gastroenterology, spinal cord and traumatic brain injury, and transplantation, to name a few.
Link Nomination Letter:
http://phhp-chp-a2.sites.medinfo.ufl.edu/files/2012/01/chp_nomination_award_interdisciplinary_ed.pdf
Link Award Letter: http://phhp-chp-a2.sites.medinfo.ufl.edu/files/2012/01/apa_award_letter_interdisciplinary_ed.pdf