NEW DIRECTIONS FOR THE EDUCATION OF CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGISTS - THE PRIMARY-CARE SETTING, THE VAS PRIME PROGRAM, AND THE IN-DEPTH GENERALIST MODEL

As pall of this special issue on psychology in primary care settings, we describe the Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA's) new approach to education for practice in the primary care setting and we concurrentl y address some general issues related to the education of clinical psy chologists for practice in this setting. In this article we argue that the primary care psychologist, in parallel with the generalist in med icine, must have a strong generic background in clinical psychology in order to gain the broad range of clinical skills necessary to functio n effectively as an ''in-depth generalist'' (IDG) who is capable of ad dressing the variety of psychological issues that emerge in the primar y care setting. The IDG model of professional practice, which we belie ve is best suited for primary care/managed cave settings, requires ext ensive training in generic clinical skills and increased time devoted to its implementation at both the predoctoral and the postdoctoral lev els.