We also had several small-group sessions led by young clinical academics as well as leading academic psychiatrists, which gave students the opportunity to ask questions and to learn more about the wide range of career trajectories in psychiatry. We spent one afternoon touring some of Oxford’s research facilities, such as the Virtual Reality Lab, the Oxford Genomics Consortium and the Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging Centre.
In addition, there was a myriad of opportunities to socialise with other medical students, foundation doctors and psychiatrists. In fact, this article came to fruition from just that! We met there for the first time, became instant friends, and later decided to collaborate to write this article. What follows is a brief description from each of us on what aspect of the Oxford School made the biggest impact on us. It is our hope that reading this article will encourage other students who have a keen interest in psychiatry to attend such events in the future.
Link to full article
Oxford Psychiatry Autumn School (Sophie Green & Sarah Stranks)
22 May 2014
In September 2013, Oxford held its first ever Psychiatry Autumn School. This three-day event was packed full of lectures and activities that would spark any psychiatry enthusiasts’ interest. The focus of this Autumn School was primarily on a career in academic psychiatry. There were lectures delivered by eminent clinical researchers on topics ranging from how antidepressants work, to persecutory delusions, to magnetoencephalographic (MEG) studies of human cognition.