"Professionalism, Physicianhood, and Psychiatric Practice": Conceptualizing and Implementing a Senior Psychiatry Resident Seminar in Reflective and Inspired Doctoring.

BACKGROUND: Professionalism, although broadly acknowledged to be an important goal of medical education, needs to be taught well.

OBJECTIVE: We describe the content selection and structure of an elective professionalism seminar for advanced trainees in psychiatry at the Massachusetts General Hospital.

METHOD: We critically evaluate the curriculum content based on participant feedback.

RESULTS: We successfully implemented and sustained for 8 years a monthly, 10-session professionalism seminar for advanced trainees in psychiatry. The average number of participants was 4-8 residents or fellows out of a possible 12-16. The curriculum covers 3 broad domains: physicianhood, bioethics, and medical/psychiatric practice. Participants felt that they were more reflective of their practice and that were given a vocabulary to do so. Physician burnout emerged as a key professional concern.

CONCLUSION: Professionalism can be taught in a seminar but requires reaching to other disciplines (history of medicine, philosophy, and sociology) to make it meaningful and utile. Consultation-liaison psychiatrists through their interdisciplinary and team-based work are ideally situated to teach professionalism that emphasizes commonalities of psychiatry with the other medical specialties and fosters leadership.