Department of Psychiatry

Child & Adolescent Psychiatry Residency

Clinical Sites

The Children’s Hospital

The Children’s Hospital is a private, non-profit, tertiary-care pediatric hospital, which serves the Denver metropolitan area, the state of Colorado, and several surrounding states. Psychiatric treatment services include an impatient child psychiatric unit, an impatient adolescent psychiatric unit, a combined adolescent med-psych service, psychiatric day treatment, partial-hospital services for children and adolescents, outpatient services, and consultation-liaison services. Marianne Wamboldt, MD, a board certified child and adolescent psychiatrist is the Chair of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Children’s Hospital. Including Dr. Wamboldt, there are 7 faculty child and adolescent psychiatrists in this facility. The Children’s Hospital is located approximately 3 ½ miles from the University of Colorado Denver.

Colorado Mental Health Institute at Fort Logan

The Colorado Metal Health Institute at Fort Logan is the state psychiatric hospital which serves the Denver metropolitan area, including the city and county of Denver and its surrounding counties. Overall, Fort Logan serves 8 of the 20 mental health sectors of the state of Colorado. Treatment services include one inpatient service for children, two inpatient/RTC services for adolescents, and a variety of inpatient services including adult psychiatry, geriatrics, and substance abuse. Dr. Robert Hernandez, is the faculty training liaison for the facility. The Colorado Mental Health Institute at Fort Logan is located approximately 14 miles from the University of Colorado Denver.

Denver Health Medical Center

Denver Health Medical Center is the city hospital which serves the medically indigent citizens of the City and County of Denver. It is a general medical hospital which has psychiatric services consisting of a psychiatric emergency room, a drug and alcohol detoxification unit, an adult psychiatric inpatient unit, an adolescent psychiatric inpatient unit, a forensic psychiatric inpatient unit, a sheltered workshop, a medical consultation service, and several neighborhood health clinics. In addition, it provides backup to the community mental health center of the city. Robert House, MD is the Chief of Psychiatry in the hospital. John Peterson, MD, a board certified child and adolescent psychiatrist is the faculty training liaison for the facility. Denver Health Medical Center is located approximately two miles from the University of Colorado Denver.

Child and Family Outpatient Continuity Clinic

1. A required rotation for first and second year child and adolescent psychiatry residents. Residents spend approximately 10 hours per week in the evaluation and treatment of outpatients throughout their 2 years of training. The clinic is located on the University of Colorado Denver Anschutz Medical Campus.
2. Clinic faculty and staff consists of a full-time medical/clinical director, four additional full-time faculty child and adolescent psychiatrists, one faculty social worker and one full-time staff social worker, one full-time staff clinical nurse specialist and one faculty psychologist and family therapists. This is augmented by a clinical volunteer faculty of approximately 40 individuals.
3. Training activities include triage, diagnosis, treatment, and systems consultation/intervention (e.g. schools, social services agencies, courts, non-psychiatric physicians and mental health practitioners). Both short and long-term treatments are provided. Individual treatment modalities include parent counseling, family therapy, and individual psychodynamic, learning/cognitive/behavioral, and pharmacologic therapies. A “private practice” model is utilized’ i.e., an after-hours answering service is provided, and residents are responsible for the care of their patients on a 24 hour basis.
4. This is a comprehensive, public child and adolescent psychiatric clinic serving children from birth through age 18, parents and families. Under the rubic of the Child and Adolescent Outpatient Clinic, there are 4 specialty clinics: Infant, Family Therapy, Adolescent Substance Abuse, and Developmental Disabilities. Averages of 500 patient visits occur each month. The clinic accepts Medicare, Medicaid, private insurance, and contracts. Male patients slightly exceed female patients in number. Ethnic/cultural mixture is reflective of that of the greater Denver area, i.e. Caucasian, Black, Hispanic, Asian, and American Indian. All major DSM-IV child an adolescent disorders are represented. Prominent among these are disruptive behavior, affective, anxiety, psychotic, adjustment, eating, substance use/abuse, developmental and developing personality disorders. Duel/multiple diagnoses are common.

5. Residents maintain a caseload of approximately ten hours per week. On average, this represents more than ten ongoing cases as many children, parents, and families are seen at a frequency of less than once per week. Conversely, some children, parents, and families are seen in excess of once weekly. Residents are assigned cases as needed to maintain a caseload of adequate size and diversity. Residents may also solicit/accept direct referrals of cases of interest. In that this is an ongoing rotation of two years duration, all resident gain experience with long-term therapies where they are clinically indicated and supported.

All residents receive two hours minimum weekly of outpatient supervision. Typically this includes supervision from the primary faculty in the clinic and from the two clinical volunteer faculty supervisors. Second year residents are allowed to make specific requests for supervisors of choice, often with a particular clinical interest/expertise. In addition to these two hours weekly of outpatient supervision, each of the specialty clinics – Infant, Family Therapy, Adolescent Substance Abuse, and Developmental Disabilities- provide supervision for their own cases.