The Division of Substance Abuse (DSA) of the Department of Psychiatry at Yale University School of Medicine will develop a curriculum to train early career clinician-scientists in scientifically validated behavioral treatments for substance use disorders. This curriculum will rely on an empirically-based clinical trials training approach to bring participants to criterion levels of adherence and competence in the treatments targeted for training. Psychiatric resident and clinical psychology fellows within Yale's addiction research training program will be provided with Options in Psychotherapy Training to learn any one of 4 substance abuse treatment approaches: cognitive behavioral therapy, contingency management, motivational interviewing, and twelve step facilitation. The curriculum will be called OPT4. The curriculum will involve intensive workshop training and supervised practice with patients at Yale-affiliated clinical treatment programs. Supervision will include fidelity rating feedback based on the Yale Adherence and Competence System and coaching by DSA faculty members who have established expertise in the treatment approaches. The Yale DSA offers an ideal setting in which to place OPT4 in that it has a longstanding tradition of development, enhancement, training, and dissemination of empirically validated psychotherapies, extensive faculty research and training expertise in each of the four treatments, seven addiction research centers, four training fellowships, and a coordinated seminar and fellowship mentoring system. OPT4 will evaluate the extent to which participants reach criterion levels of performance that would be required for certifying therapists to participate in clinical trials , develop a curriculum manual, and disseminate it nationally if the curriculum is found to be effective.
Showing the most recent 10 out of 11 publications
