Primary care practitioners’ views on child psychiatry teaching in medical school

Dear Sir

Most youth rely on primary care physicians (PCPs) for identification and care of psychosocial problems. Medical undergraduate psychiatric curricula are an essential foundation and source of information and skills. This pilot project surveyed academic PCPs, residents and faculty electronically about child and adolescent psychiatry (CAP) medical school education content and relevance; some physician demographic information was also collected. Ninety-nine surveys (10.2%) were returned. Years since medical school graduation correlated positively with agreement (r = 0.220, p < 0.05) that CAP topics are clinically important. CAP topics were rated as somewhat important or higher by pediatric (92%), medicine (29%), family medicine (100%) and other (83%) physicians. Pediatricians (78%), internists (64%), family medicine (57%) and other (65%) practitioners experienced some CAP medical school training with the top three categories for all specialties including learning about psychosocial development, behavior and psychiatric illness in youth. For all specialties, explaining medical problems and helping parents understand development were among the top four categories of psychosocial practice. Pediatricians (mean rank = 55.19) ranked CAP topics as significantly more important than internists (mean rank = 20.14); there was no difference between pediatricians and family medicine (mean rank = 63.08) or other (mean rank = 42.88). Faculty rated CAP topics higher than trainees U = 706.5, p < 0.05. There were no significant differences based on gender t (89) = 0.735, p > 0.05 or medical school type U = 286, p > 0.05. Respondents endorsed the value of CAP topics regardless of medical school type, practice length or gender. The results support the view that CAP topics should be included in medical school curricula since even physicians less likely to work with children and adolescents consider these subjects valuable and useful clinically. More research is needed to confirm these findings in a broader, representative sample of practicing physicians and to continue to explore what CAP content is most beneficial.