Psychology Internship Program

Hines is institutionally affiliated with Loyola University of Chicago, Stritch School of Medicine, and also maintains affiliations with the University of Illinois-College of Medicine, Chicago, and Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. Loyola University Medical Center, which shares a campus with Hines, is one of the largest medical centers in the Chicago area, with 523 licensed beds on a 70-acre campus.

The units and patient pro­grams served by  Psychology Service include:

• Addictions Treatment Program
• Blind Rehabili­tation
• Community-Based Outpatient Clinics
• Community Living Center (Geriatrics)
• Emergency Department
• General Medicine and Surgery
• Health Promotion and Disease Prevention Program
• Hematology/Oncology
• Home Based Primary Care
• Infectious Disease
• Palliative Care Clinical Team
• Multidisciplinary Pain Clinic
• Behavioral Sleep Medicine
• Inpatient/Residential Rehabilitation Psychiatry
• Managing Overweight/Obesity in Veterans Everywhere (MOVE) and Bariatrics Program
• Memory Disorders Clinic
• Mental Health Clinic
• Mental Health Intake Center
• Mental Health Intensive Case Management
• Organ Transplant Evaluations
• Opioid Treatment Program
• Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation
• Polytrauma Program
• Primary Care Mental Health Integration Program (Primary Care Behavioral Health)
• Reproductive Mental Health
• Women’s Health Clinic
• Psychosocial Rehabilitation and Recovery Center
• Spinal Cord Injury & Disorders
• Substance Abuse (inpatient and residential)
• Traumatic Brain Injury Clinic
• Trauma Services Program

The staff of Psychology Service is comprised of 64 doctoral-level psychologists, and two program assistants. The broad range of expertise, background and experience represented in the staff at Hines is also reflected in the diversity of their professional assignments throughout the hospital.

Most staff members are involved in the training program as either major or secondary supervisors. Some supervisors hold faculty appointments at universities in the Chicago area and are active in funded research endeavors. Our ability to provide both broad-based generalist training in clinical core competencies and a tailored internship experience reflects our wealth of rotational placements and supervisors at Hines.

The Psychology Service at Hines VA has enjoyed a long tradition of training future psychologists. The service presently maintains externship, internship and fellowship training programs that are designed to foster collaboration between externs, interns and fellows. The Psychology Service has supported a psychology practicum program since 1947, and a Psychology Internship since 1950. The program has been formally accredited by APA since 1976. Seven interns are funded within our Internship Program this year.  Psychology also maintains a postdoctoral fellowship training program in Clinical Psychology with five emphasis areas:

• Trauma and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder
• Integrated Care Psychology/Primary Care Mental Health Integration
• Geropsychology & Integrated Care
• LGBTQ+ Health Care
• Inpatient Medical Care

Our traditional practice fellowship program was awarded 10 years of full APA re-accreditation in October of 2019. 

Psychology also maintains a two-year specialty fellowship program in Clinical Neuropsychology.  This program was awarded ten years of full APA Accreditation in November 2017.

The Hines VA Psychology Internship Training Program offers graduate students from APA-Accredited programs a 12-month in-depth training experience. We believe that the best training to prepare today's interns for the demands of tomorrow's professional challenges consists of providing the highest quality learning experiences to enhance maximum proficiency in clinical work across socio-economic and cultural boundaries that can be adapted to a variety of settings. Toward this goal, the Hines Internship Program provides training experiences in the context of a broad exposure to both medical and psychiatric patients from a variety of backgrounds. Reflecting our principle that clinical practice must embody a research- and theory-based orientation, we afford interns an experience in which clinical practice is integrated with the scholarly inquiry surrounding clinical work.

Our Program attempts to recruit a diverse internship class with consideration to applicants’ diversity status, through a formal non-discrimination policy, and through its clinical and didactic programming that demonstrates the strong value the program places on diversity and multicultural competence and humility. We aim for internship cohorts that are characterized by cultural and individual diversity as well as geographic and theoretical diversity. We strongly believe that a mix of students from various universities and demographic backgrounds makes for a rich training experience.

The internship year will begin June 17, 2024. Applications due: November 1, 2023

We offer a stipend of $37,208.

 

Tracks:

General Track (6 positions): The General Track is ideal for interns wanting to specialize in general mental health, health psychology, or a combination of the two.

Neuropsychology Track (1 position): The Neuropsychology Track is designed to offer specialized experiences in the areas of neuropsychological assessment and psychological intervention in adherence with the Houston Conference/Division 40 guidelines for training.

Please refer to our Brochure for a detailed description of our Internship Program and application requirements.

 

Questions related to the program’s accredited status should be directed to the Commission on Accreditation:

Office of Program Consultation and Accreditation

American Psychological Association

750 1st Street, NE, Washington, DC 20002

Phone:

E-mail: apaaccred@apa.org

Web: www.apa.org/ed/accreditation

Dear Applicant:

Thank you for your interest in clinical training in Psychology at Hines VA.  We believe our APA-Accredited program is one of the finest at the internship level.

We are proud of our reputation as a program that produces highly competent graduates ready for entry-level practice in clinical and counseling psychology.  Most of our interns move on to one of their highest ranked postdoctoral or employment positions immediately following completion of their doctoral studies and internship.

Training occurs within a very warm and nurturing environment that is conducive to interns’ professional growth and to their development of an identity as a clinical or counseling psychologist.  Our program is learning- and training-based, as opposed to production-based.  Service delivery is subsumed under the interns’ training needs and interests.  Interns determine, to good measure, their rotations, focusing on their training needs and interests.  Intensive and extensive supervision and education are program priorities, and our staff is dedicated to training and mentoring interns.

We currently have seven interns per class and anticipate having seven for our 2024-2025 class.  We attempt to form a class each year that is characterized by geographic and individual diversity, and we have been successful in this endeavor.  We strongly believe that a mix of students from various universities and demographic backgrounds makes for a rich internship training experience.

Our brochure is available on our webpage and provides comprehensive information about our program.

Applicants will be notified by December 15th, 2023 regarding whether or not they are invited for an interview.

The complete application package must be available on or before November 1, 2023.  Please refer to the link on our home page titled "Application Information" for details.

We look forward to your application and to the possibility of meeting you this winter. Please reach out with any questions at katherine.meyers@va.gov.

 

Sincerely,

 

Katherine Meyers, Ph.D.

Psychology Training Director

Applicants showing the best fit for our program will be invited to interview with us. All interviews will be conducted via a videoconference platform. Dates in italics  are expected to be primarily for neuropsychology applicants.

Each interview day will begin with a 45-minute group meeting with the training director at 8 a.m. This group meeting will be followed by a series of three 30-minute individual interviews. One of these individual interviews will be with the Training Director and the other two will be with members of our Internship Training Committee. Following the interviews, you will have a brief break to have lunch. At 1 p.m. there will be a 30-minute group videoconference meeting with some of our current interns.

2024 INTERVIEW DATES

• January 3
• January 4
• January 5
• January 8
• January 9
• January 11
• January 12
• January 16
• January 17
• January 18
• January 19
• January 22

Celebrating Unity in Diversity

The practicum, internship, and postdoctoral fellowship training programs within the Psychology Service at Hines VA are committed to fostering and upholding an inclusive community that welcomes and supports trainees from all social identity groups. We believe a multi-pronged approach to creating an inclusive and supportive environment within our training programs is essential. Some of the ways in which we have sought to create an inclusive and affirming environment for all are:

• Cultivating and promoting an atmosphere of inclusion and acceptance, in which all individuals are supported and included within our work and professional environment.
• Welcoming honest and open discussion about issues in diversity
• Incorporating diversity as a central component of our clinical training and didactics
• Enhancing awareness of diversity issues through monthly case presentations
• Attracting psychology staff and trainees of diverse backgrounds to join our Psychology Service and our training programs Hines VA

 

Psychology Diversity & Inclusion Committee

Within our Psychology Service, our efforts to promote diversity are led by our Psychology Diversity & Inclusion Committee – a group of staff psychologists and trainees (fellows and interns) who coordinate and oversee continuing efforts to build our community. The Psychology Diversity & Inclusion Committee serves the Psychology Service and the Mental Health Service Line (MHSL) in the following three primary ways:

Education and Training: Provide staff and trainees with opportunities to learn about and discuss a variety of diversity-related issues. These can include but are not limited to: trainings for staff and trainees, trainings specific to trainees, trainings specific to supervisors, CE training for staff, etc.

Consultation: Provide consultation to individual staff members, clinics, and/or programs around diversity issues as it relates to Veteran care. This can include but is not limited to: providing in-services/trainings to staff or Veterans in a clinic/program about a variety of diversity issues (e.g., microaggressions, language in the LGBTQ+ community) and helping staff find resources for a Veteran (e.g., transgender support groups in Chicago).

Hiring & Retention: To assist in ensuring cultural and professional diversity among Psychology externs, interns, postdoctoral fellows, and staff. This can include but is not limited to: helping the Training Committee in recruiting diverse trainees and assisting the Psychology department in recruiting, hiring, and retaining diverse staff.

 

Please see below for DEI Learning Opportunities available to Interns.