The field of psychiatry is both incredibly fascinating and equally as mysterious, particularly for those people who are unfamiliar with the scientific research and proven theories behind the discipline.
So, whether you are currently training to work within the healthcare sector of psychiatry and are starting to consider your options after course completion, or else you are already fully qualified and are looking for your next professional challenge, then you have come to the right place for information and inspiration.
Continue reading to learn how to further progress your career in the field of psychiatry.
Psychiatry as a Specialism
As you may already be fully aware, the branch of medicine and healthcare referred to as ‘psychiatry’ deals almost entirely with the prevention, long-term treatment, and initial diagnosis and analysis of a patient involved with emotional, behavioral, and mental disorders.
There is a wide plethora of diverse reasons and catalysts why a person may either be referred to a psychiatrist or else seek out a psychiatrist of their own volition, and can vary between the short-term and longer issues which have been present for some time.
Notable Skillsets, Traits & Predispositions for Psychiatrists
As with any professional, especially vocational, career pathway, there are plenty of skills, ‘bedside manners’, and personality traits within an individual that vary between mandatory and advisable when it comes to pursuing a career as a psychiatrist. Moreover, such qualities are even more necessary when it comes to focusing on progressing your career to the next level.
After the successful acquisition of a degree in psychiatry, even though you will have been steeped in academic literature and been exposed to numerous on-the-job situations, it will certainly still take a while for you to adapt to the unique environment of working in psychiatry.
Notably, there are four key skill sets that you need to work on, both in a professional and a personal context, when focused on elevating your career in psychiatry, namely communication skills, dealing with emotions, a wealth of knowledge and understanding, and an aptitude for managing uncertainty.
Communication in Psychiatry
Naturally, excellent people skills and an aptitude for communicating with people from all different walks of life are essential to anyone working professionally in the healthcare sector.
However, as a practicing psychiatrist or psychiatric nurse, your communication skills are even more important, and in your education and experience so far, you will undoubtedly already have experienced clients who are unable to talk to you openly.
Listening and understanding what your patient is saying to you is the cornerstone of psychiatry, and moreover, both practices should be conducted in an entirely non-judgmental way. Learning everything about each client’s private and personal history is crucial in coming to an accurate and productive diagnosis and treatment plan, and this can take a long time in certain cases.
Understanding, patience, and strong communication skills are, therefore, crucial – moreover, when you are looking to progress your career in the field, such as becoming a forensic psychiatrist, you should work on improving your communication skills even further. One excellent way to further progress your career in the field of psychiatric nursing is to enroll in an online post masters PMHNP, which you can study and complete while still working in your current professional role since it’s completed online, affording greater convenience and flexibility.
Emotional Management for Psychiatrists
When it comes to managing emotions, this applies to the patient and how you manage your feelings towards what you hear and experience through the narrative of your client’s conversations.
If, for example, a client you are dealing with becomes verbally hostile, or even worse, physically aggressive, then separating their reaction from how they really feel becomes just as important as never taking what they say to you personally. Although reading this article in a moment of peace, you could never possibly imagine yourself reacting negatively to such a confrontation; things could be a lot different in the heat of the moment.
Psychiatrists and psychiatric nurses who work predominately in secure mental health units in jails and prisons, for example, are exposed to much more of an unpredictable range of emotions and situations than those who work in a general hospital setting. If you are interested in progressing to become a prison psychiatrist or psychiatric nurse, then this management of emotions is something you need to focus on moving forward.
Luckily, there are plenty of ways to do this. Some suggestions to improve how you deal with both your own and other people’s emotions and strengthen your emotional intelligence include the following:
- Take responsibility for how you react to what you hear
- Make a point of identifying your patient’s emotional triggers
- Never assume a patient is going to react a certain way
- Try not to preach an ‘absolute-positive’ mental attitude thinking to your client
- Never be afraid to ask for help from professional mentors and colleagues alike
- Remember that not everyone is able to have the same perspective you do
Knowledge & Experience Expansion for Psychiatrists
Obviously, the world of healthcare and medicine is a science, and all treatments and new discoveries are entirely scientifically based. However, there is another level to certain aspects of medicine, particularly psychiatry, which lends itself to a more psychological and creative way of thinking and discovering.
One excellent example of this is when it comes to widely used and exceedingly beneficial anti-depressants, which have been long since said to replace a lack of serotonin in the brain Serotonin is a vital chemical in the brain that transmits messages between nerve cells. As such, people suffering from MDD (Major Depressive Disorder) are said to benefit from anti-depressants, which are believed to replace this depletion of the hormone.
However, more recent medical studies appear to have suggested that a lack of serotonin does not cause depression, even though anti-depressants containing the chemical still make a monumental difference in the lives of patients suffering from the condition.
This one example alone proves that, aside from a purely scientific approach, it is also highly necessary to study the sociocultural factors and contexts surrounding a client’s situation. The more you learn about the art and science of psychiatry, the better prepared you are to accurately diagnose a patient and, more importantly, develop a treatment plan that will help them get better.
Managing Uncertainty for Psychiatrists
Finally, as touched on earlier in the article, psychiatry is a field of medicine in which researchers and practitioners are constantly finding out more and more. Therefore, there are still a plethora of causes and effects that are still not fully understood.
Not only is there a notable amount of uncertainty surrounding the root causes of certain mental health issues, but this level of uncertainty also applies to the progression and journey of your patient’s mental health issue itself.
Diagnoses often change over time, for example, in the case of depression. For some of your clients, they will be aware of the catalyst that spiraled them into depression, for instance, a death of a loved one or another traumatic event in their life. If this is the case and critically, they started to deal with how they were feeling and sought medical help in a timely fashion, then hopefully, with your expertise and treatment plan, they will be able to fight off the illness relatively quickly.
Conversely, however, if a person is suffering from depression, anxiety, or any other of the various mental health issues and the causes are not instantaneously clear, or indeed if your patient is resistant to accepting help, their mental health issue can carry on for months and even years.
In the case of depression, for example, it is common for a person with Major Depressive Disorder to take a certain dosage of anti-depressants during a depressive disorder, but then, when their symptoms start to subside, they could have their dosage reduced.
Specialisms Within the Field of Psychiatry
It is perfectly normal to qualify as a psychiatrist and to continue working in the field of psychiatry as a general psychiatrist.
If this is the career pathway that you are currently working towards, or else you are already practicing as a general psychiatrist, then you will only ever work with patients who are over the age of sixteen. There are, however, certain specialisms within psychiatry that may well pique your fancy when it comes to looking into progressing your professional career even further.
Child & Adolescent Psychiatry
Child and adolescent psychiatry, also alternatively referred to as pediatric psychiatry, is a complex yet incredibly rewarding specialism and has even more of an emphasis on creative approaches to medicine and treatment.
Child psychiatrists deal with children up to the age of sixteen who are living with one of a plethora of different mental illnesses, including depression, eating disorders, psychosis, ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder), behavioral issues, self-harm, and suicidal thinking, and life adjustment to divorce or bereavement.
If you are heading into child psychiatry from another profession entirely, then after the completion of medical school and during your first few years of practice, you might look to be earning between $32,000 and $38,000 a year – although this is just an average and may not always be the case. You will need outstanding levels of empathy, emotional resilience, and the ability to stay calm under great amounts of pressure.
Psychotherapy
Psychotherapy is a specialism of psychiatry that is incredibly similar to its parent medical discipline, but one that solely centers around talking therapy alone. Psychotherapy is one of the most useful ways of helping a client work through their current emotional issues and also break apart and subsequently work to eradicate any deep-seated problems and thought patterns.
There are several different types of psychotherapy, and when looking into progressing your career in the field, you would do well to focus on one particular branch.
CBT (Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) is one of the most effective types of therapy to help people suffering from depression to change how they think and react to certain emotional triggers, which changes the effects on their brain accordingly.
Dialectical behavior therapy is a specific type of CBT that works to help regulate the core emotions of a patient in everyday life rather than when confronted with a specific emotional trigger. Often dialectical behavior therapy is used to help treat and improve the lives of individuals who are experiencing suicidal thoughts and engaging in self-harm or are suffering from PTSD.
IPT (Interpersonal Therapy) is much more of a short-term form of therapy and is concerned with resolving debilitating issues which have been present for a number of years, such as unresolved grief. IPT is successful in patients who are aware that something which happened to them long ago has not been dealt with properly and are therefore looking for new ways to improve communications with others and to handle their own thoughts and emotions.
Supportive therapy is perhaps the one form of psychoanalysis that involves the minimum amount of guidance from a medical professional and rather works to encourage the patient to develop their own means of thinking, expressing, and emoting. Supportive therapy has been proven to be effective in a wide range of different individual situations, most notably when a spouse has been verbally and/or physically abused, to help them start again.
Additionally, creative arts therapy, whereby patients are encouraged to engage in drama, art, and music classes, as well as play therapy for children to talk about how they are feeling in a relaxed and non-pressured setting, are beneficial. There’s also animal-assisted therapy, which is especially effective for kids and the elderly.
Although psychotherapy is a more modern branch of psychiatry, it is vastly becoming one of the sought-after professional pathways in the field of mental health, and a fully qualified psychotherapist might expect to earn between $48,000 and $53,000 a year – again, though, this is an average and may not always be the case.
Jack Griffiths
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