Other disorders commonly viewed as the domain of adult psychiatry, including schizophrenia and manic-depressive disorder, typically crystallize in adolescence or early adulthood, with early signs sometimes evident in infancy. Psychosocial adversity in early life reverberates through the lifespan, and most theories of personality development and disorder emphasize early developmental influences and predispositions. For these reasons, child psychiatrists offer unique perspectives on psychopathology across the life cycle. Furthermore, as psychiatry seeks a niche as a primary care specialty, the capacity to treat whole families spanning several generations of psychopathology will become increasingly valuable. In practice, many adult psychiatrists treat adolescents.
Child psychiatry remains among the few shortage specialties in medicine.
Didactic Training For the past three years we have employed a unique and innovative approach to didactic training. Other clinical responsibilities are reduced to ensure that this time is actually available. It is thus possible to rapidly and thoroughly cover the rudiments of child psychiatry before clinical commitments seriously compete with scholarly good intentions. Classes from January through June are modeled after graduate seminars in which topics of special interest receive close scrutiny. For the second year of child residency, intensive didactics in principles of consultation and psychosomatics, educational issues, and forensic psychiatry are presented in July.