Equity, Diversity and Inclusion

The University of Washington Psychiatry Residency is committed to recruiting, supporting, and retaining a diverse cohort of physicians to provide equitable care to an increasingly diverse patient population.

Our residency program has an Antiracism Committee composed of faculty and residents/fellows that meets monthly. We also have a yearly elected Resident EDI Lead who has a half day per week to help spearhead EDI initiatives within the program.

Antiracism Committee & Resident EDI Lead

The Antiracism Committee is composed of faculty and residents who meet monthly on the first  Wednesday of the month from 4-5pm. Meetings are open to any faculty and residents who would like to attend.

Members self-select into subcommittees that are determined yearly based on residency needs. Subcommittees have completed projects such as creating curricular resources, designing and implementing faculty development training, and surveying the current residency climate. The committee also participates in voluntary field trips within the community, such as a recent visit to the Wing Luke Museum and the Wa Na Wari Walk the Block event.

Antiracism Committee Mission Statement

The field of psychiatry has been complicit in supporting racist institutions and practices. Structural racism in psychiatry continues to impact patients, trainees, psychiatrists, mental health policy and our broader community.

We commit to addressing ongoing racist practices and structural racism within the field of psychiatry through the following goals:

• Recruiting and retaining a diverse group of residents
• Fostering a welcoming climate within the UW Psychiatry Residency Program that specifically supports medical students/residents/faculty who are Black/African-American, Native-American/Indigenous, Hispanic/Latino, Asian/Asian-American and People of Color.
• Educating residents and faculty about cultural humility and structural racism
• Advocating for antiracist policies and efforts in our medical system and broader community
• Soliciting perspectives from community members (including clinicians, mental health clients, peers and family members and other interested parties) and incorporating these voices into our goals.

We commit to measurable change within these goals. We will hold ourselves accountable by maintaining transparency of our activities, posting our goals and progress, and reporting outcomes measured qualitatively and quantitatively, as appropriate.

Resident EDI Lead

Our Resident EDI Lead is elected yearly and is given a half day per week to help spearhead EDI initiatives within the program. Responsibilities include helping to organize the Antiracism Committee meetings, helping to organize the URM Support Group, providing mentorship to participants of the UW Visiting Scholars Program, participating in Admissions Committee, helping the Recruitment Chief arrange recruitment events for underrepresented applicants, helping with quality improvement of the residency EDI didactic curriculum, and helping to advocate for and support our underrepresented residents with the help of leadership.

Resident Support

URM Support Group

The URM Support Group provides a safe space for residents who are under-represented in medicine to process their unique experiences. The group meets quarterly in person during protected didactic time and is led by underrepresented alums of the program. After-hours events are also held periodically, such as a dinner hosted by one of our underrepresented courtesy faculty.

NURF

Residents can join the University of Washington Network of Underrepresented Residents and Fellows (NURF) for additional support, which is a resident and fellow led organization co-sponsored by the UW Graduate Medical Education Office and the Office of Healthcare Equity.

Curriculum

EDI module

There is a dedicated EDI module within the didactic curriculum that spans the four years of training. This module includes topics such as structural competency, social determinants of mental health, bias in the clinical encounter, the Cultural Formulation Interview, an LGBTQ series, religion & psychiatry, ableism, the history of racism and sexism in psychiatry, cultural psychiatry, and global mental health.

EDI Toolkit and Consultation Service

EDI topics are also deliberately embedded throughout the four-year curriculum. Module leaders are encouraged to consider where these topics best fit within their series. All individual lecturers are provided with an EDI Toolkit that instructs them to make practical changes to their lecture as well as access to an individual consultation service. Lecturers receive an aggregated evaluation from residents after their talk that explicitly includes a question about how EDI was discussed within their lecture.

Recruitment

Our recruitment process includes a holistic evaluation of residents’ motivation for psychiatry, personal attributes and life experience, clinical excellence, and academic potential and scholarship. Application screening and interviews are completed by a diverse group of residents and faculty who complete a mandatory implicit bias training and orientation to our holistic selection criteria. Standardized interviews are completed for all applicants to assess applicants’ ability to cultivate a growth mindset and work in teams, core values of our program. The Admissions Committee is composed of residents and faculty with a commitment to building a diverse and inclusive residency class. Committee members complete anti-bias training, evaluate applicants with a structured holistic assessment tool, and participate in a debrief each year with goals for improvement. Ranking data is periodically analyzed for bias, with feedback to the committee to make process improvements. The residency class recruited to start in July 2023 included 18% residents who are underrepresented in medicine, which is consistent with the percentage of underrepresented residents in psychiatry nationally.

Visiting Scholars Program

The Visiting Scholars Program provides an opportunity for fourth year residents from historically underrepresented backgrounds to complete a rotation with us to consider our residency program. The program is led by Dr. Heidi Combs, the Vice Chair of Education, and is supported by philanthropic donations. Participants attend educational events and receive mentorship from our Resident EDI Lead.