Psychiatric Pharmacy
Postgraduate Year 1
The overall goal of the program is to develop general clinical skills, clinical teaching and knowledge of medicine and psychiatry necessary for clinical practice and to qualify for USC’s PGY2 psychiatric residency. Early commitment for the PGY2 year is an option.
In addition to coursework and clinical practice, residents will attend grand rounds in medicine and neuropsychiatry, and present at professional meetings.
Clinical Practice
The residency’s major training sites include Keck Medical Center of USC and the Los Angeles County+USC Medical Center Psychiatric Hospital and Clinic. Keck Medical Center is a tertiary care teaching center specializing in surgeries, organ transplants and internal medicine. It has a neurology service and a 10 bed psychiatric unit and some outpatient services. LAC+USC has 70 adult psychiatric beds and 10 adolescent beds, while the clinic has 1,500 active treatment cases.
Residents receive extensive clinical experience by providing such services as drug therapy monitoring, drug consultation to staff, medication-use evaluation, protocol development, medication therapy management and patient education. In addition, after six weeks of orientation to acute care medicine services, residents spend one day a week as primary therapist for a caseload of psychiatric outpatients for the entire year.
Teaching
Residents are actively involved in the Therapeutics curriculum for teaching PharmD students by developing a lecture and case study with preceptor supervision and by leading case conferences for second and third level PharmD students. Residents are responsible for student supervision, including pharmacy rounds, participation in teaching conferences and participation in oral examinations.
Research
Residents may collaborate with faculty at Keck Hospital of USC in their ongoing research projects or may choose some other topic of interest. Faculty interests include: infectious disease, critical care, ambulatory care, geriatrics, pediatrics, psychiatry, sleep medicine, institutional practice and instructional technology, among many others. Dr. Kevin Forrester are the overall PGY-1 residency program directors. Dr. Erin Knox coordinates the residency application process, rotation assignments and research project. Dr. Knox coordinates psychiatric experiences with Dr. Julie Dopheide, the PGY-2 psychiatric residency director.
Each resident presents his or her project at the Western States conference for pharmacy residents and preceptors and also is encouraged to present at the College of Psychiatric and Neurologic pharmacists (CPNP).
Contact Us
If you have questions or need additional information, please contact:
Erin D. Knox, PharmD,
Assistant Program Director
Office: (323) 442-1454
Direct Dial Pager: (213) 717-7704
Email: Erin.Knox@health.usc.edu
William C. Gong, PharmD, FASHP
Associate Professor of Clinical Pharmacy
Director, Residency & Fellowship Training
USC School of Pharmacy
1985 Zonal Avenue
Los Angeles, CA 90089-9121
(323) 442-2625
Postgraduate Year 2
The psychiatric pharmacy specialty residency is a post-graduate second year (PGY2) residency program offered by the University of Southern California School of Pharmacy in cooperation with the Keck School of Medicine’s Department of Psychiatry and the Behavioral Sciences.
The overall goal of the PGY2 program is to develop competent psychiatric pharmacy practitioners with emphasis on clinical skills, clinical teaching and knowledge necessary for psychiatric practice. The PGY-2 resident will be qualified to take on a clinical faculty or clinical psychiatric specialist position and apply for Board Certification in Psychiatric Pharmacy (BCPP).
Applicants must have completed a PGY1 residency prior to starting their PGY2 residency year. Three nationally known psychiatric pharmacy faculty members—Drs. Stimmel, Dopheide and Park—are involved in precepting the resident during different clinical rotations. Additional pharmacy and medicine faculty provide selective experiences.
Clinical Practice
Residents provide clinical services including: drug therapy monitoring, drug consultation to staff and patient education. Each resident also acts as primary therapist for a caseload of patients for the entire year. The residency’s major training sites include Keck Medical Center of USC, the Los Angeles County+USC Medical Center Psychiatric Hospital and Clinic, and the Center for Community Health Safety Net Clinic. The hospital has 70 adult beds and 10 adolescent beds. The Center for Community Health (CCH) clinic’s psychiatric caseload varies from 20 to 35 patients. As the program director at USC was integrally involved in the development of the American Society of Health-System Pharmacists (ASHP) Standards/ Learn¬ing Objectives for residencies in psychiatric pharmacy, the objectives of our residency are clearly reflected in the official ASHP document.
Responsibilities of the resident include provision of clinical services (e.g., drug therapy monitoring, drug consultation to staff and patient education). In the outpatient clinic, the resident acts as a primary therapist for a caseload of patients for the entire year. Specialty clinics (e.g. geriatrics, epilepsy) are optional for the PGY2 year.
Additional Requirements
Beyond the coursework provided to all pharmacy residents at USC, psychiatric pharmacy residents attend selected seminars and conferences offered by the Department of Psychiatry. In addition, residents participate in regularly scheduled psychiatric pharmacy business meetings for program planning.Residents also select from a range of selective options in psychiatric pharmacy- related areas, including:
- Acute Care Psychiatry
- Behavioral and Developmental Pediatrics
- Child/Adolescent Psychiatry
- Eating Disorders
- Emergency Psychiatry
- Geriatrics Psychiatry
- HIV Psychiatry
- Neurology
- Substance Abuse/Addiction
- PGY2 clinical rotations and preceptors
Teaching
Residents are actively involved in the Therapeutics curriculum for teaching PharmD students by providing didactic lectures and developing psychiatric case studies with preceptor supervision.
While at the clinical site, residents are responsible for student supervision, including pharmacy rounds, participation in teaching conferences and participation in oral examinations.
Research
Residents may collaborate with any of the psychiatric pharmacy faculty in their ongoing research or choose another topic of interest. Psychiatric faculty research interests include:
- Psychiatric pharmacy services/expanded roles (Drs. Stimmel and Dopheide)
- Depression in rheumatology and geriatric patients (Dr. Stimmel)
- Adult and pediatric psychiatry (Dr. Dopheide)
- Sleep disorders (Drs. Dopheide and Stimmel)
- Consultation and liaison psychiatry (Dr. Park)
- Psychoneuroimmunology and adult psychiatry (Dr. Park)
- Rheumatology and geriatric psychiatry (Dr. Stimmel)
Dr. William Gong, the overall residency program director, offers a research seminar series to guide the resident’s project development and completion along with their primary preceptor. Residents are required to present at the College of Psychiatric and Neurologic Pharmacists Annual meeting and may also present at the Western State’s Conference for Pharmacy Residents and Lecturers.
Contact Us
If you have questions or need additional information, please contact:
Julie A. Dopheide, PharmD, BCPP
Program Director, PGY-2 Psychiatric Pharmacy Residency
University of Southern California
School of Pharmacy
1985 Zonal Avenue
Los Angeles, California 90089-9121
Telephone: (323) 442-1454
Fax: 818-442-1681
Cell: (818) 749-4999
Email: dopheide@usc.edu
William C. Gong, PharmD, FASHP, FCSHP
Director, Residency and Fellowship Training
Associate Professor of Clinical Pharmacy
University of Southern California
School of Pharmacy
1985 Zonal Avenue
Los Angeles, California 90089-9121
Telephone: (323) 442-2625
Email: wgong@usc.edu, Res-Fellow@pharmacy.usc.edu
