Introduction

Thank you for your interest in the University of Washington Psychiatry Residency's Idaho Advanced Clinician Track. Idaho is one of five states included in the WWAMI program developed by the University of Washington to bring advanced medical training into underserved and largely rural areas in Washington, Idaho, Alaska, Montana, and Wyoming. These intermountain west states are known for the beauty of their outdoor surroundings and the individualistic, laid back attitudes of their communities. Boise, Idaho is a thriving community that has grown rapidly over the past several decades so that demand for psychiatric services has much outstripped supply.

To help meet this need, WWAMI, the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, and major healthcare institutions in Boise have joined forces to create the Idaho Advanced Clinician Track of the University of Washington Psychiatry Residency Program. This venture is exciting for several reasons. First, residents can take advantage of training opportunities in both urban and rural settings. In Seattle, residents will receive strong training in basic medicine and psychiatry in a rich, academic environment. In Boise, residents will have ample time to focus their training in anticipation of the transition to clinical practice. Second, this new program has attracted faculty who are enthusiastic about teaching and interacting with residents. We envision residents developing close, collegial relationships with faculty and with each other. Third, the program has received strong support from the State of Idaho, the Idaho Medical Association, the Idaho Psychiatric Association, both tertiary medical centers in Boise, and the Boise VA Medical Center. The psychiatric community is ready for this program!

In Seattle, PGY-1 and PGY-2 residents will receive training in internal medicine or pediatrics, neurology, inpatient psychiatry, emergency psychiatry, and subspecialties, such as child and adolescent, geriatric, and addiction psychiatry. In their second year, residents will begin outpatient clinic and participate in a psychotherapy training program that takes advantage of Seattle's rich psychiatric community. The third and fourth years in Boise will focus primarily on outpatient and consultation liaison (psychosomatic medicine) rotations. Weekly half-day didactics and individual psychotherapy and psychopharmacology supervision will continue throughout the PGY-3 and PGY-4 years. Much of the fourth year will be spent in elective rotations and so will be tailored to each resident's needs and interests. Faculty in Boise have especially strong interests in psychosomatic medicine, post-traumatic stress disorder, women's mental health, community psychiatry, geropsychiatry, child and adolescent psychiatry, and mindfulness in medicine. Finally, the well established University of Washington core third year medical student psychiatry clerkship rotation at the Boise VA and University-affiliated Family Medicine Residency Program of Idaho offer opportunities for teaching, consultation to primary care residents, and a warm and friendly medical training community.

We hope that you will visit us to learn more about this exciting new program and the Boise area!

Jeralyn Jones, M.D. Attending Psychiatrist, St. Alphonsus Regional Medical Center, Consulting Psychiatrist, Family Medicine Residency of Idaho Associate Director, Idaho Advanced Clinician Track

We are very pleased that you are interested in the Idaho Advanced Clinician Track of the University of Washington Psychiatry Residency Program. This track is designed to provide superb and balanced training for those residents planning careers in smaller, non-urban settings.

As the only medical school in five states (Washington, Idaho, Wyoming, Alaska, Montana), the University of Washington has as one of its core missions the goal of training physicians for this region. The Idaho Track grew out of our department's commitment to this mission as well as the regional and national shortage of psychiatrists practicing outside of large urban areas. The goal of the program is to provide the broad-based training necessary to prepare residents both to work as general psychiatrists in underserved areas and to collaborate effectively with primary care providers in these communities.

The program combines the strengths of the academic university environment in Seattle with those of the community practice setting of Boise. Residents spend the first half of training in Seattle, where they can take advantage of a large and diverse academic faculty, specialized clinical opportunities, and active research programs. In Boise, residents benefit from integrated training experiences in outpatient psychiatry, inpatient and outpatient consultation-liaison psychiatry, community mental health, and a wealth of elective opportunities. Didactics, clinical rotations, and psychotherapy training are carefully planned across the years in Seattle and Boise to form a cohesive and high quality educational program.

We hope that you will take this opportunity to learn more about the Idaho Advanced Clinician Track. We look forward to hearing from you and hope to meet you in the future!

Richard C. Veith, M.D. Professor and Chair Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences	Deborah S. Cowley, M.D. Professor and Director Psychiatry Residency Training Program