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Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior

Women’s Mental Health Fellowship

Focused clinical training in women’s mental health with an emphasis on perinatal psychiatry.

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Women’s Mental Health Fellowship

Focused clinical training in women’s mental health with an emphasis on perinatal psychiatry.

The Women’s Mental Health fellowship at Women & Infants Hospital, a Brown University teaching affiliate and a leading specialty hospital for women and newborns, is designed to offer focused clinical training in women’s mental health with a particular emphasis on perinatal psychiatry.

Fellows will receive in-depth exposure to and training in pharmacotherapy for pregnant and breastfeeding women, interpersonal psychotherapy, perinatal loss, substance abuse in perinatal women, socio-cultural influences on perinatal psychiatric illness, trauma-based disorders, and the impact of maternal mental illness on the developing fetus and infant, and perimenopausal and premenstrual mood disorders. Fellows will spend clinical time in the nation's first mother-baby psychiatric partial hospital program for women with perinatal psychiatric disorders.  They will also have exposure to consultation/liaison in a women’s hospital, as well as experience in providing outpatient consultation to women’s health clinics.  Fellows will gain experience treating pregnant and postpartum women with substance use disorders, and spend time in a partial hospital program focusing on dialectical behavioral treatment.

Fellows will have the option to conduct a more focused study in any of the core areas of training, as well as add elective opportunities to supplement their training.  Fellows will also have protected time to facilitate the pursuit of a scholarly project in women's mental health under the supervision of a research mentor.

We are excited to be able to offer comprehensive women’s mental health training for psychiatrists with an emphasis on reproductive psychiatry.  We hope that you will browse through our information and in doing so, see and share our passion for women’s mental health and reproductive psychiatry!

Jessica Pineda, MD – Program Director
Women’s Mental Health Fellowship

Margaret Howard, PhD – Associate Program Director
Women’s Mental Health Fellowship

Faculty

Leadership

  • Jessica Pineda

    Jessica Pineda, MD

    Fellowship Program Director & Medical Director, Women's Behavioral Health, Attending Psychiatrist, Women & Infants Hospital, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior (Clinical) and Clinical Instructor in Family Medicine, The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, Attending Primary Care Physician, Women & Infants Hospital
    Research Profile
  • Margaret Howard, PhD

    Margaret Howard, PhD

    Director, Division of Behavioral Health, Department of Medicine, Women & Infants Hospital, Associate Fellowship Program Director, Clinical Psychologist, Women & Infants Hospital, Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior (Clinical) and Medicine (Clinical), The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University
    Research Profile

Faculty

  • Lynne Andreozzi-Fontaine, PhD

    Adjunct Associate Professor of Pediatrics, Coordinator of the NICU Network Neurobehavioral Scale (NNNS) Training Program
  • Kenneth Chen, MD

    Obstetric Internist, Women & Infants Hospital, Division Director and Fellowship Director, Obstetric and Consultative Medicine, Assistant Professor of Medicine, The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Zobeida Diaz, MD

    Attending Psychiatrist, Women & Infants Hospital, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Shannon Erisman, PhD

    Director, Postpartum Day Hospital Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior (Research), Brown University Alpert Medical School, Clinical Psychologist, Women & Infants Hospital
  • Anupriya Gogne, MD

    Attending Psychiatrist, Women & Infants Hospital, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Erica J. Hardy, MD, MMSc

    Director of Women’s Infectious Disease Consultation Services, Women & Infants Hospital, Assistant Professor of Medicine & Obstetrics and Gynecology, The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Kathleen Hawes, PhD

    Adjunct Assistant Professor of Pediatrics, The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Cynthia Loncar, PhD

    Director of Clinical Services, Center for Children and families at Women & Infants Hospital, Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior (Research), Assistant Professor of Pediatrics (Research), The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Theresa Morgan, PhD

    Director, Women’s Partial Program, Butler Hospital, Clinical Psychologist, Butler Hospital, Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, Brown University Alpert Medical School
  • Amy Salisbury, PhD

    Associate Professor of Pediatrics (Research), The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Emily Spurrell, PhD

    Clinical Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior, The Warren Alpert Medical School, Private Practice and Women & Infants Hospital
  • Jean Twomey, PhD

    Assistant Professor of Psychiatry and Human Behavior (Research), Assistant Professor of Pediatrics (Research) The Warren Alpert Medical School
  • Kristin Wedel, LCSW

    Clinical Social Worker, Women & Infants Hospital

Curriculum

 
Rotations
WIH Postpartum Depression Day Hospital
WIH Inpatient Consultation/Liaison Service
Butler Women’s DBT Partial Program
 
Longitudinal Outpatient Experience
Women's Behavioral Health
Perinatal Substance Use
Outpatient Electives

Fellows will choose longitudinal electives to match their clinical interests, which will be integrated into their schedule throughout the year.

  • The Postpartum Depression Day Hospital, the nation’s first mother-baby perinatal psychiatric partial hospital devoted exclusively to treating pregnant and newly postpartum women.  It is located at Women & Infants Hospital. The program is designed to keep mothers and their infants together during treatment to foster bonding and attachment, avoid separation of mother and baby, support breastfeeding mothers and directly assess and design interventions focused on the day when impacted by maternal mental illness. This rotation will introduce the fellow to the recognition and treatment of perinatal psychiatric disorders. The fellow will function as a member of our multi-disciplinary treatment team and be expected to participate in daily clinical rounds, conduct first-day admission evaluations and make pharmacological recommendations, co-lead psychotherapy groups, conduct family sessions, conduct short-term individual psychotherapy, provide ongoing medication management and participate in discharge planning. The fellow will receive training in various therapeutic modalities and become familiar with psychopharmacology in pregnant and breastfeeding women.
  • Perinatal substance abuse experience is comprised of training in substance use assessment and treatment in outpatient and inpatient settings. Outpatient settings include the Center for Women’s Behavioral Health, where a significant percentage of pregnant as well as post-partum women present with dual diagnosis. Substance use treatment focuses on early recovery, relapse prevention, parenting skills, smoking cessation, domestic violence, and self-care.  The fellow will gain expertise in the pharmacologic management of substance use disorders and dual diagnosis issues in this population. Evidence-based therapeutic approaches in addiction treatment, such motivational interviewing, DBT for substance use and attachment based work will also be discussed. On our Consultation-Liaison Service, the fellow will gain expertise in the treatment of withdrawal from different substances (Opioids, Benzodiazepines and Alcohol). The fellow will gain a broader understanding of opioid dependence and its effects on the baby, by working with the Pediatrics team treating Neonatal Abstinence Syndrome. As a result of this comprehensive experience, the fellow will be comfortable providing care for pregnant or postpartum women with substance abuse disorders and comorbid psychiatric issues.
  • Psychiatry Consultation–Liaison Service provides the fellow the opportunity to develop expertise in providing inpatient psychiatric consultation in an OB-GYN hospital setting with multiple clinical services, including postpartum, high-risk obstetrics, gynecologic oncology, gynecology, a 24-hour Obstetric Emergency Department, and an 80-bed NICU. Fellows will provide consultation to both academic and private clinical teams.  The consultation team works closely with the hospital clinical social work department to identify patients in need of psychiatric intervention. Additionally, the fellow will gain experience in clinical bedside teaching and supervision with rotating PGY-2 general psychiatry residents and MS-4 medical students on this service. 
     
  • Brexanolone (Zulresso™) is currently the only FDA approved medication for postpartum depression and requires a 60 hour infusion during a hospital admission. Our fellows have the opportunity to gain experience in this hormonal treatment modality. During their year-long fellowship they have the opportunity to evaluate and refer patients for brexanolone infusion and manage their treatment during their hospital admission at Women and Infants Hospital, as well as following the infusion. 
     
  • Women’s Partial Hospital Program is a day-hospital program at Butler Hospital that treats women who are chronically suicidal and who meet the criteria for Borderline Personality Disorder. The Women’s Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) program combines individual therapy and group skills training to address the behavioral, emotional and cognitive patterns that underlie their problems in living. The fellow will work closely with the clinical staff at this program to learn about the care and stabilization of this patient population.
     
  • Women’s Behavioral Health longitudinal outpatient experience will provide the fellow with a longitudinal experience in the outpatient psychopharmacologic and psychotherapeutic care of pregnant and postpartum women. Additionally, the fellow will gain expertise in pre-conception counseling for women planning a pregnancy. They will also be trained and practice various forms of psychotherapy in this population, including interpersonal therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy and psychodynamic psychotherapy with a focus on attachment issues.

Fellows will have the opportunity to add elective experiences in addition to the core curriculum at the following clinical sites as part of their training experience. Some of those elective experiences are highlighted below:

  • Consultation Clinics:  The fellow will have the opportunity to provide outpatient psychiatric consultation to a variety of women’s health populations.  These sites include the Obstetric Medicine Clinic (providing internal medicine care to pregnant women with ongoing medical problems), Gynecologic Oncology (providing care to women with gynecologic and breast cancer), and Reproductive Endocrinology and Infertility.  The fellow, in collaboration with supervisors, will evaluate patients and provide liaison work with women’s health colleagues while simultaneously learning about the intersection of mental health and medical illness.
  • Interpersonal Psychotherapy and Perinatal Loss Experience:  The fellow will be able to receive clinical training and supervision in interpersonal psychotherapy, a widely researched and validated treatment for postpartum depression, as well as psychotherapy with patients experiencing perinatal loss.  They will develop a theoretical framework for the understanding of loss that includes pregnancy attachment, parenting tasks, and normal grief.  Psychotherapy supervision will be provided by faculty with specific training and experience in IPT.

Other electives opportunities include:

  • Trauma assessment and psychotherapy
  • Dialectical behavior therapy in the perinatal patient
  • Psychodynamic psychotherapy in the perinatal patient
  • Perimenopausal mood disorders

Fellows will participate in focused scholarly activity throughout the duration of the 12-month fellowship under the mentorship of Dr. Cynthia Battle or another women’s mental health expert who serves as a member of the program’s faculty. The specific nature of the scholarly activity will vary depending on the individual fellow’s interests, research background, and future career goals. The two primary goals of this component of the fellowship are: 

  1. to promote the fellow’s skills as a critical consumer of the medical and scientific literature relevant to women’s mental health and perinatal psychiatry, and
  2. to develop an area of focused expertise on a specific topic related to women’s mental health.

In the initial phase of the fellowship year, the fellow will meet with the research director of the fellowship to develop an individualized plan for their scholarly component, and to identify a primary scholarly advisor. Throughout the course of the year-long training experience, the fellow will have protected time to devote to their scholarly goals (approximately 3-4 hours/ week), including regular supervision from their research advisor. Ultimately, the scholarly activity component of the fellowship is expected to culminate in either an external scholarly presentation (i.e., an abstract presented at a scientific conference, grand rounds presentation) or in an original manuscript to be submitted for publication. Through these scholarly activities, the fellow will hone their skills in evaluating the quality of published research, gain practice in reviewing and coherently synthesizing research, and will produce a final product that demonstrates their expertise in an area of study directly relevant to women’s mental health.

Didactics

Didactic lecture series will be offered to the fellow on a regular basis, on a variety of topics that are relevant to the clinical practice of women's mental health.  Some of the regular topics include:

  • Psychopharmacology in the pregnancy and lactation
  • Perinatal depression
  • Perinatal anxiety disorders
  • Perinatal-onset OCD
  • Bipolar disorder in pregnancy
  • Postpartum psychosis
  • Trauma-related disorders
  • Attachment theory and disorders of attachment
  • Oncology and Psychiatry
  • Infertility
  • Treatment decision making and informed consent 
  • Interpersonal psychotherapy
  • Grief/perinatal loss

In addition, the fellow will participate in a variety of scheduled conferences and grand rounds for ongoing education and collaboration, including:

  • Department of Psychiatry and Human Behavior Grand Rounds (Butler Hospital)
  • Women’s Behavioral Health Case Conference
  • Specialty Care in Pregnancy Conference
  • Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Grand Rounds
  • Integrated Grand Rounds for High-Risk Pregnancy
  • NICU Psychosocial Rounds
  • Schwartz Rounds

The Fellow may also be asked to lecture in a variety of formats, including case conferences, grand rounds, resident teaching sessions, and resident and medical student supervision. In addition to didactic and conference educational opportunities, the fellow will receive both individual and peer supervision on a regular basis related to the clinical care of patients.

Training Sites

Fellows will have the experience of being a member of a multi-disciplinary treatment team in the following settings:

Women & Infants Hospital (WIH), the primary teaching affiliate of The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University for obstetrics, gynecology and newborn pediatrics, as well as a number of specialized programs in women’s medicine and women’s behavioral health. WIH is the seventh largest obstetrical service in the country with more than 8,500 deliveries per year.  The fellowship is housed in the Department of Medicine, Division of Women’s Behavioral Health at Women & Infants Hospital.

Butler Hospital (BH) the primary teaching affiliate of The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University recognized as one of the top ten psychiatry departments in the nation. It is the state's only non-profit, free-standing psychiatric hospital providing adults, seniors and adolescents specialized assessment and treatment for all major psychiatric illnesses and substance abuse.

Fellows will be part of the Department of Psychiatry & Human Behavior at The Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University, a nationally renowned academic department and training program in Providence, Rhode Island.

Apply

Program Requirements and Application

To be eligible for application to the fellowship, the candidate must:

  • complete a residency or plan to complete a residency in general adult psychiatry prior to the anticipated start date of the fellowship program
  • be board-certified or board-eligible with the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology in adult psychiatry
  • hold or be eligible for an unrestricted RI medical license

Candidates wishing to apply for the fellowship should send the following documents to Françoise Niang via email or fax (401) 453-7658:

  • letter of interest (not to exceed one page)
  • curriculum vitae 
  • three (3) letters of recommendation, including one from their Program Director 
  • application (download from link)

If you wish to learn more about the fellowship program or have specific questions, please contact Dr. Pineda via email.

We are accepting applications starting May 1, 2023. Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis, so early submission is encouraged.

Application

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Women’s Mental Health Fellowship