Specialty Training in Women’s Mental Health

Professional development opportunities for clinicians.

McLean’s Division of Women’s Mental Health is dedicated to offering professional development opportunities in the field of women’s mental health. By promoting clinician education, the division aims to strengthen the knowledge base of this emerging field and also support the ongoing mental well-being of girls and women.

Clinical Psychiatry Fellowship in Women’s Mental Health

With support from the Kathleen and Ronald Jackson Family Foundation and other donors, the division offers a clinical psychiatry fellowship to an early career psychiatrist who has completed residency training and wishes to pursue a fifth year of clinical training in women’s mental health.

In addition to two months of learning evidence-based best practices in each of the division’s clinical treatment programs, the fellow spends two months in the women’s mental health program at Brigham and Women’s Hospital learning about reproductive psychiatry, including treatment for women during the prepartum, pregnancy, and postpartum time periods, as well as during menopause.

In 2020, we welcomed our fourth fellow, Kayia Akoun, MD. The fellowship’s fifth fellow, Ranjani Logaraj, MD, will join the program in July 2021.

Our 2019-2020 fellow, Ashley Beaulieu, DO, now serves as psychiatrist-in-charge on McLean’s Trauma and Dissociative Disorders Inpatient Program. Our 2018-2019 fellow, Amanda Sedgewick, DO, is a psychiatrist-in-charge on our Alcohol, Drug, and Addiction Inpatient Program and continues her outpatient work with women and addiction, including women affected by intimate partner violence. Our 2017-2018 fellow, Anne Blythe Rose, MD, MPH, is now an attending psychiatrist in The Pavilion.

Watch Now!

Dr. Laura Payne talks about women’s mental health as part of McLean’s weekly Grand Rounds lecture series

Gunderson Personality Disorders Institute

The Gunderson Personality Disorders Institute at McLean Hospital was founded in 2013 to elevate awareness and training for evidence-based treatments for borderline personality disorder (BPD) and accompanying psychiatric conditions.

Led by director Lois W. Choi-Kain, MEd, MD, the Gunderson Institute offers conferences and workshops for clinicians. By providing training to clinicians, the institute aims to increase the quality of care and access to treatment for patients with borderline personality disorder.

Course topics include mentalization-based treatment (MBT)—offered in conjunction with the Anna Freud Centre for Children and Families, dialectical behavior therapy (DBT), general psychiatric management (GPM), and transference-focused psychotherapy (TFP)—offered in conjunction with the TFP-New York.

The Gunderson Institute offers specialty learning opportunities focused on the assessment and treatment of adults and teens with borderline personality disorder. Join us for an upcoming training.

Sarles Young Investigator Award for Research on Women and Addiction

The Sarles Young Investigator Award provides a unique opportunity for an individual early in her career to explore how gender can impact addiction and treatment.

Dr. Amanda Sedgewick, a former clinical fellow in women’s mental health, has been selected as the recipient of the 2020-2021 Sarles Young Investigator Award, which will enable her to develop and test the feasibility and satisfaction of a group therapy intervention for women with substance use disorders who have experienced intimate partner violence.

Dr. R. Kathryn McHugh was the recipient of the award 2018-2020, Dr. Linda Valeri was the awardee 2017-2018, and Dr. Dawn Sugarman was the awardee 2015-2017.

Cathie Cook Lectureship

The McLean Hospital Annual Cathie Cook Endowed Lecture on Women’s Mental Health at Grand Rounds was established to honor Cathie Cook, the vice president of Development at McLean for almost two decades. Cook was a proponent and supporter of McLean’s Division of Women’s Mental Health. She passed away in 2017 and her family and friends established a fund to endow a special lecture focused on women’s mental health in her honor.