Friday, April 26, 2024
12-12:40 p.m. Presentation by Robert Smith, MD
12:40-12:55 p.m. Questions & Dialogue
Register here to lunch in person with colleagues
at MSB Lecture Hall (Room 274)*
(*Registration closes at noon on Monday, April 22, 2024)
Or attend virtually via Zoom call-in
The chronic shortage of psychiatrists means that primary care clinicians provide 75% or more of all mental health care. Unfortunately, few have received supervised training in the care of depressed patients and have been left to their own devices to provide care. In this talk, Dr. Robert Smith will address two key problems in depression management: failing to identify most depressed patients and failing to supplement medications with patient-centered and motivational interviewing principles. By understanding that most depressed patients in medical settings present only physical symptoms, clinicians will be equipped to identify many more depressed patients. Dr. Smith will also detail how to treat depression using the Mental Health Care Model (MHCM), the only evidence-based model for the primary care management of depression and other mental illnesses.
Robert C. Smith, MD, MACP, is a University Distinguished Professor and a professor emeritus of medicine and psychiatry at Michigan State University. He has been involved in teaching and research in patient-centered communication and primary care mental health since 1985. He and his colleagues defined the first evidence-based patient-centered interview, now published in a popular interviewing textbook, Smith’s Patient-Centered Interviewing: An Evidence-Based Method (4th edition). It is used in medical, nursing, and other health care schools in the US and abroad for teaching interviewing and the doctor-patient relationship. Dr. Smith’s group also identified the first evidence-based method, the Mental Health Care Model, to guide primary care clinicians in managing mental health and substance use problems. The resulting text, Essentials of Psychiatry in Primary Care: Behavioral Health in the Medical Setting, was published in 2019.
