February 22, 2017

The OHSU School of Medicine is responding to a call from primary care providers for focused mental health training to meet the needs of their patients.

The school's Division of Continuing Professional Development is offering its first ever mental health for primary care providers conference. Mental Health: Challenges and Treatment in Adult Primary Care is Friday, March 17 at the Sentinel Hotel in Portland with a remote conference offered at Bay Area Hospital in North Bend/Coos Bay to reach rural providers on the south coast.

"We planned this conference in response to requests from attendees at other conferences who shared their concerns about lacking sufficient training to care for the mental health needs of their patients," said Christine Flores, director of continuing professional development for the school. "We hope the conference can better equip our front-line providers and are especially pleased to pilot the remote participation option on the south coast, recognizing the need for this skillset in our rural communities."

The division invited an OSU student health center physician to review and offer feedback on the curriculum for the conference.

"I was pleased to see OHSU reaching out to those of us who do this kind of work every day," said Shanilka deSoyza, M.D., Oregon State University Student Health Services. "I hope that it will make the conference more relevant to the needs of primary care providers." 

The target audience for the conference is family physicians, internists, nurse practitioners, physician assistants and other providers of adult care. Learn more and register.