Pediatric Neuropsychology Elective

The Pediatric Neuropsychology Elective of the APA-accredited Clinical Psychology Internship at Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), in affiliation with Harvard Medical School (HMS), offers intensive training in the neuropsychological assessment and care of children and adolescents with a wide range of medical, neurological, and neurodevelopmental conditions.

The MGH Neuropsychology Division within the Department of Psychiatry includes the Learning and Emotional Assessment Program (LEAP) and the Psychology Assessment Center (PAC). LEAP is the pediatric neuropsychology clinic, while PAC is the adult neuropsychology clinic; both are located at One Bowdoin Square in Boston, MA. The pediatric neuropsychology intern will primarily work within LEAP.

Clinical Training

Assessment

Interns gain extensive experience conducting comprehensive neuropsychological evaluations with children and adolescents presenting with varied conditions including epilepsy, brain tumors, multiple sclerosis and demyelinating diseases, genetic disorders, movement disorders, neurodevelopmental disorders (e.g., ADHD, learning disorders, autism spectrum disorder), and complex medical presentations. Evaluations emphasize the holistic integration of cognitive, socio-emotional, academic, and behavioral data in the context of neurodevelopment and cultural factors. Over the course of the year, interns become increasingly independent in case conceptualization, test selection and administration, scoring, interpretation, report writing, and feedback with families and referring providers.

Interns will typically perform two full neuropsychological evaluations per week. Interns may also provide neuropsychological consultations to parents. Opportunities for interdisciplinary collaboration with psychiatry, neurology, genetics, epilepsy, and other specialties are a key component of training. The program follows APA/Division 40 guidelines for internship training in clinical neuropsychology, informed by principles from the Houston and Minnesota conferences. The expectation is that interns will eventually pursue board certification in clinical neuropsychology with subspecialty certification in pediatric neuropsychology.

Outpatient Treatment

Pediatric neuropsychology interns will provide psychotherapy to children and adolescents who are referred to the Child Psychiatry Outpatient Clinic. Patients may present with multiple psychological, social, and medical challenges, and interns may participate in individual child therapy, cognitive behavioral therapy, parent guidance interventions and family therapy. Interns will typically have two outpatient therapy cases per week.

Pediatric Acute Psychiatry Service

All interns do a six-month, four-hour per week rotation providing intervention services in an acute setting. Pediatric neuropsychology interns may choose to either: 1) provide short-term individual and family-based intervention for children and adolescents who are being evaluated in the MGH Emergency Department’s Pediatric Acute Psychiatry Service (APS) or, 2) complete their acute rotation on our medical psychiatric inpatient unit (Blake 11) attending patient rounds, seeing patients individually, and co-leading groups. While Blake is a mixed adult unit, there are often opportunities for child interns to see transitional age youth (age 18 to 26) for individual inpatient psychotherapy.

Didactics

In addition to the internship core didactics, there are didactic experiences for pediatric neuropsychology interns that are attended by postdoctoral fellows in neuropsychology, as well as child psychology interns. Clinical Rounds includes a monthly case conference, as well as fact-finding exercise. Collectively, didactics cover neuroanatomy, neurodevelopment, developmental psychopathology, medical/neurological disorders in childhood, and professional development.

• Child Psychology Seminar: 1 hour per week, 3 weeks/month
• LEAP Clinical Rounds: 1 hour per week
• Child CBT Seminar: 1 hour per week for 6 months
• Optional Didactic Experiences
  • Psychiatry Grand Rounds
  • Neurology Grand Rounds
  • Behavioral Neurology Rounds
  • Epilepsy Case Conference/Neurosurgical Rounds
  • Movement Disorders Surgical Rounds
  • Neuroradiology Rounds
  • Family Therapy Seminar

Supervision

• Assessment supervision: 2 hours per week by LEAP faculty
• Individual psychotherapy supervision: 1 hour per week
• Research supervision: 1 hour per week

Mentorship

In addition to the many opportunities for informal mentorship at MGH, pediatric neuropsychology interns will also meet for 1 hour, at least twice a month, with the internship track director for formal mentorship of the internship experience and planning for post-doctoral fellowship.

Research Opportunities

While the internship is clinically focused, interns may participate in ongoing research at LEAP and/or affiliated labs, with potential opportunities for scholarly publications or presentations. Current research focuses on issues related to neuropsychology practice (e.g., efficacy of parent consultations and telehealth evaluations) and the relationship between variability in neuropsychological profiles and developmental psychopathology.

After Internship

Within the MGH Neuropsychology Division, there are multiple two-year postdoctoral fellowships that pediatric neuropsychology interns may pursue, including a fellowship in pediatric neuropsychology and a fellowship in lifespan neuropsychology. Additional opportunities for research-oriented interns may also be available and should be discussed with the pediatric neuropsychology track director. The MGH Neuropsychology Division has a strong record of retaining interns for postdoctoral fellowships and faculty positions within MGB.

Related Links

• Learning and Emotional Assessment Program (LEAP)
• Psychology Assessment Center
• Child and Adolescent Psychiatry