Doctoral Internship - South Sacramento - Kaiser Permanente Mental Health Training Program Northern California (2024)

Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity

Equity, Inclusion, and Diversity (EID) are key foci of the internship program in South Sacramento. Our service area is one of the most diverse in California and provides opportunities to work with an economically, ethnically, racially, and linguistically diverse community.

We support our commitment to EID issues through our weekly Cultural Conversations seminar. This seminar is conducted by a clinic psychologist with expertise in EID who has no formal affiliation with the doctoral internship program, which contributes to creating an environment of accountability and emotional safety in discussing themes related to EID, clinical work, and how systemic issues impact the lives of our interns on a professional level.

Interns also have opportunities to participate in our local EID Committee. This committee is dedicated to improving the wellbeing of Kaiser Permanente members and staff in our Department of Psychiatry through expanding formal and informal spaces to explore, process, and become educated in areas related to EID. The committee also works toward increasing awareness of EID issues to improve staff morale and engages in planning for trainings, cultural encounters, discussions, celebrations, and other culturally affirmative experiences to improve culturally affirmative care for our diverse communities here in South Sacramento.

Didactic Training and Seminars

Regularly scheduled weekly didactic seminars are organized and administered by the Kaiser Permanente Northern California (KPNC) Mental Health Training Program. Interns are required to attend the two-hour weekly seminar, which focuses on aspects of clinical practice that the interns may not regularly encounter.

Diversity issues are always integrated into seminar presentations. Seminar topics include Frontiers in Trauma Treatment; Advanced Risk Assessment; Updates in Substance Abuse Research & Treatment; Advancements in Psychopharmacology; Cognitive Processing Therapy; Technology and Mental Health; Trans/Nonbinary Mental Health; Building a Better Brain through Exercise, Nutrition, Sleep and Stress Management; and Self-Compassion.

The KPNC Mental Health Training Program also sponsors professional training courses for continuing professional development. These courses and presentations are offered at select times during the year for all KPNC mental health trainees and medical center staff. The KPNC Mental Health Training Program brings in national experts and keynote speakers on a variety of cutting-edge topics in mental health treatment and research. Interns are expected to attend all MHTP Speaker Series seminars. Current seminar schedules and a list of speakers and topics can be found on the KPNC Mental Health Training Programs website. In addition, many of these lectures are recorded and available on this website under the Continuing Education Seminar Library.

Meetings and Case Consultation

Supervision

All doctoral interns are supervised by licensed psychologists and are assigned to a primary and secondary supervisor. These two clinical supervisors meet with their assigned intern one hour per week for individual face-to-face supervision, for a total of two hours of individual supervision per week. The primary and secondary supervisor in each training track is responsible for supervising the direct delivery of clinical services. The primary supervisor takes the lead role in developing the intern’s learning plan, monitoring their progress, and evaluating their training schedule. The primary supervisor is also responsible for supervising the intern’s clinical work and completing quarterly evaluations after gathering input from the other delegated supervisors and staff who have worked with the intern.

Doctoral interns are also provided with weekly clinical group supervision and group supervision for psychological assessment. During clinical group supervision, interns learn how to conceptualize treatment plans and frame interventions through a cultural framework that considers age, gender identity, race and ethnicity, family systems, socioeconomic status, work and school history, and other cultural factors. Interns also gain experience presenting clinical cases, as well as giving and receiving peer feedback. These feedback interactions help interns to develop both collegial and supervisory aspects of their professional identities as psychologists. Assessment group supervision provides support for interns gaining proficiency conducting psychological evaluations. During assessment group supervision, interns have an opportunity to discuss several aspects of the assessment process, including how to interpret test results, formulate clinical impressions, and plan patient feedback.

Community Partnership Program

Reflecting Kaiser Permanente’s core commitment to mental health and wellness in our communities, each doctoral intern will spend at least 32 hours during their training year on a Community Partnership Project that focuses on improving mental health in the local community beyond Kaiser Permanente patient membership.

The goal of this project is to provide outreach to underserved populations in the community to promote healthy behaviors. Anchors for this project include developing alliances with individuals and/or systems to improve the lives of those served; providing education and training based on the empirical literature; collecting, analyzing, and presenting relevant outcome data to partnership stakeholders.

The scope and focus of the projects are site specific, reflecting the unique opportunities available in each community to develop meaningful partnerships. Projects are developed in conjunction with the site training director and can take a wide range of forms. Many Community Partnership Projects entail psychoeducational programs at local high schools or community centers, with emphasis in such areas as mindfulness, stress reduction, parenting education, anger management, or communication trainings. Other projects have involved staff consultation at county or non-profit agencies (e.g., homeless shelters, community mental health clinics, prisons, etc.).

Psychological Assessment

All staff psychologists participate in psychological testing and trainings, and discussions related to psychological assessment are a part of the culture of the South Sacramento Department of Psychiatry.

All doctoral interns complete psychological testing as part of the internship training program. During the training year, interns further their knowledge about test battery design, administration of various tests and measures, interpretation and integration of test results, and communication of test results. All interns complete at least four multimodal, comprehensive psychological assessment batteries. Common reasons for referral include evaluation for ADHD and ASD, complex differential diagnosis, developmental assessments, and therapy and medication treatment planning.

Interns meet weekly with a psychological testing supervisor who is not their primary supervisor to gain specialized supervision personalized to their experience, interests, and training needs.

Research Training

At the beginning of the training year, the site training director works with each doctoral intern to determine which research-based training activity they will engage in over the course of the training year. Interns may choose to collaborate with local department staff to develop a site-specific program evaluation project, collaborate on a program evaluation project with the MHTP Evaluation and Quality Improvement Lab (EQI Lab), or join the MHTP Journal Club.

• Site-Specific Program Evaluation: projects are focused on existing clinic service lines, treatment programs, or patient care workflows and should fall within the regular scope of departmental services. Projects may involve collecting and analyzing administrative data to improve operations, or they may be a quality improvement/assurance project whose purpose is to improve or assess existing Kaiser Permanente programs or procedures (e.g., evaluation of factors associated with treatment outcomes or an empirical needs assessment of a clinical area that would be enriched by psychological services). Interns meet regularly with training faculty over the course of the training year to review progress on their projects.
• MHTP EQI Lab Program Evaluation: projects are guided by quality improvement goals that extend beyond local, site-specific programs. Projects may focus on outcomes of training program models, the impact of MHTP specialty training, the effectiveness of MHTP-sponsored treatment programs, or the incorporation of outcomes measures into clinic workflows. The EQI Lab holds weekly, 1-hour meetings throughout the training year to coordinate MHTP program evaluation projects and monitor progress. During these weekly lab meetings, interns receive consultation from MHTP clinical supervisors to ensure that their projects are relevant to current clinical work, integrated into clinical care, and appropriate for dissemination.
• MHTP Journal Club: research training consists of reviewing and critically evaluating research within a select subfield of psychology and developing a didactic tool for other clinicians to use to augment their clinical practice during the delivery of services within KP Mental Health. The primary expectation for interns in the Journal Club is to prepare brief presentations that take place during the last month of each quarter. The Journal Club holds monthly, 1-hour meetings in addition to weekly presentations during the last month of every quarter.

Adult Outpatient Track

Doctoral interns in the Adult Outpatient Track will spend their entire training year providing services in our community-based Adult Outpatient Clinic. Patients seen in this department have a range of challenges and concerns, including depression, anxiety, trauma, adjustment problems, and relationship stress.

Interns participating in this track are provided with ample, comfortable space to complete their clinical work and see patients. Interns also have opportunities to facilitate group psychotherapy and gain experience through rotations in specialty services, such as the Depression Care Clinic and Cognitive Processing Therapy Clinic.