The Community Mental Health Curriculum is a program designed to train medical students experientially using group therapy based on a culturally competent framework and delivered in a diverse community clinic.  Students gain clinical skills for future interprofessional collaboration in patient-centered care. This program’s curriculum focuses on culturally competent group therapy for use with third year medical students during their psychiatry clerkship elective. Medical students are supervised by a behavioral health professional and are offered multidisciplinary experiential training of group therapy sessions for mentally ill populations. The six-week curriculum also includes a self-assessment as a pre- and post-measure for competencies. Based on these evaluations, supervisors focus on assigned readings for psychological literature, practice scenarios, skill applications, and debriefings that complement the students’ competencies.

Through training experience on group therapy principles in action, future physicians may enhance their skill set for collaborating with other professionals in the provision of culturally responsive interdisciplinary health care.