The Mental Health Foundation has the task of providing care to the community in seven main areas called Care Products, namely Psychiatric Clinic Care, Crisis intervention, Faraja Center for re-integration and education, Psychiatric Home Health Care, Admissions and Prevention and Information.The Prevention and Information program is presently mainly conducted in schools and on occasion to businesses as well. In schools Information and Prevention also promotes health care vocations as future opportunities for students. Medical students also have to make a choice of specialization during their studies, but certainly need to know what support they can get from psychiatry regardless of the choice they make.
The Psychiatry Perceptorship program provides an opportunity for medical students and others to learn about research methods and clinical care in the field of psychiatry. MHF has an agreement with the American University AUC for medical students.
This program is supervised by the psychiatrist of MHF Dr. Sachin Gandotra who focuses on the observation of psychiatric clinical services with emphasis on the clinical care of patients. The program includes opportunities for:
- Self study from select3ed readings and electronic media
- Informal shadowing of the psychiatrist, psychologist and the clinical staff in the department of psychiatry.
- Informal group meetings with mentors and clients in the department of psychiatry
The first group of 6 students started their preceptorship in January 2012 and each has completed it with an evaluation of the period, their comments were primarily:
- "An Amazing Experience" and asked if they could return to learn and experience more. The experience was above and beyond my expectations and reaffirmed my interest in psychiatry.
- Dr. Gandotra was very good at teaching and explaining concepts to both patients and to me as a student.
- Not only did he make me feel comfortable being there, but also I found the experience to be very valuable and enjoyable a great job.
- It is a great place to do psychiatric rotation and Dr. Gandotra was excellent. Thank you.
For more information go to the MHF web site: www.mhf-sxm.com.
