Teaching Spotlight: Mental Health Discovery Subject

This four-week topic focused on psychological trauma and trauma-informed practice, which is increasingly recognised as essential to safe, equitable, and compassionate clinical care. However, trauma-informed practice is rarely embedded systematically in medical education. In response, we developed and implemented a new subject, When the Going Gets Tough, that emphasises self-reflection, experiential learning, and is aligned with the pedagogical foundations of psychiatry education.

The subject was brought together by members of the Department of Psychiatry, in collaboration with affiliates through Phoenix Australia, the Victorian Doctors Health Program, Listening to Voices, cross-discipline learning experiences, and the Centre for Collaborative Practice.

We have an exceptional team of mental health educators who delivered the face-to-face content focused on interactive and reflective learning. Students followed a number of storylines of a community through a range of current and past traumatic experiences and explored the impact of physiology, coping strategies, inequities, developmental histories, and family, workplace, and community responses in the aftermath of disaster.

Sixteen students were enrolled in the subject launch. The four-week subject combined clinical placements in settings including general wards, community alcohol and other drug services and mental health services, online modules, and face-to-face teaching. Weekly workshops featured skill development, student debates, role-plays, and invited speakers. Students participated in weekly group supervision facilitated by psychiatrist-educators, as well as an interdisciplinary workshop co-designed with lived experience performers.

“Trauma is traumatic. But having the opportunity to learn about trauma systematically, recognising triggers, discussing pervasiveness, and growing and adapting our clinical knowledge to recognise and acknowledge trauma was incredibly beneficial in shaping my development as a holistic, empathetic clinician.” (Student Quote)

In 2026, the subject will run again with a much larger cohort and will, for the first time, include rural students. It will build on the pilot with further integration of planetary informed practice.

In the words of the classic song, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going”, we hope to equip our students with the skills to rise to the challenges that lie ahead in their future clinical practice.

Special thanks to our teaching staff Dr Skye Kinder, Dr MJ Yoo and to Denise Ho at the Centre for Collaborative Practice.