MIRECC / CoE

Fellows are required to develop and implement an "Education Dissemination Project" in order to enhance the education of health professionals and the quality of care provided to Veterans at their respective fellowship sites. The projects enhance the psychosocial rehabilitation beyond the training site. The projects focus on a variety of dissemination efforts such as developing continuing education or research conferences for health professionals, curricula for health professions training programs, patient education materials, or clinical demonstration projects. Fellows are also encouraged to take leadership roles by developing didactic projects and disseminating educational materials through a variety of efforts (e.g., planning regional invitational meetings, developing a training website) in order to educate health professionals and advance psychosocial rehabilitation training and collaboration.

Check out Visual Abstracts of two recent Dissemination Projects below!

The PSR Fellowship Program is a year long, and each PSR fellowship site has from four to six full-time fellow positions. The fellows come from a range of disciplines, including nursing, social work, psychology, psychiatry, vocational rehabilitation, clinical pastoral education, occupational therapy, marriage & family therapy, and licensed professional mental health counseling. Fellows come to the fellowship with previous experience in working with Veterans with serious mental illness.

The fellowship program utilizes a comprehensive psychosocial rehabilitation approach to restore a Veteran's full potential following the onset of a serious mental illness. Fellows are involved in a number of clinical training experiences that take place on inpatient psychiatric units, psychosocial rehabilitation and recovery centers (PRRCs), and a variety of other VA mental health treatment settings. Interventions that fellows may provide include Veteran and family education, enhancement of residential, social, and work skills, community re-integration, whole health interventions, spiritual counseling, individual and group psychotherapy using cognitive-behavioral therapy and other strategies, motivational interviewing, pharmacotherapy and provision of intensive case coordination.

Each PSR fellowship program tailors its fellowship and discipline-specific seminars. The seminars include, but are not limited to, case presentations, workshops, coursework, conferences, and supervision. The Hub Site coordinates a monthly seminar series that offers a unified, comprehensive education and training for fellows across the nine PSR Fellowship sites. All PSR fellows are invited to attend the didactic seminar series as it is an opportunity to learn more about psychosocial rehabilitation and recovery. It is also an opportunity to potentially collaborate with other PSR sites on various psychosocial rehabilitation and recovery projects.

Fellows are encouraged to attend one national mental health conference during their fellowship year, and submit proposals for conference presentations and poster sessions on their education dissemination projects. Recent Fellowship classes have attended the Psychiatric Rehabilitation Association (PRA) Conference and the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Convention. At the end of their fellowship year, fellows are eligible to apply for PRA certification as Certified Psychiatric Rehabilitation Practitioners.

For information regarding VA Psychology Training eligibility requirements, please visit their webpage:  http://www.psychologytraining.va.gov/eligibility.asp

For additional information about VA Psychology Training, please visit their webpage:  http://www.psychologytraining.va.gov 

List of VA Psychology Training Sites including Advanced Fellowships/Interprofessional PSR Fellowship: https://www.psychologytraining.va.gov/programs.asp