An earlier post on this blog centered on finding your path to a career in psychology. In response, a reader asked about defining her path given that she would be working in a remote community. Would she truly be serving the community if she specialized in one area of clinical psychology?
Remote communities present some clear challenges to psychologists in terms of the basic provision of mental health services as well as appropriate and comprehensive treatment for those community members. When in consideration of the term "remote", we need to think beyond a geographic perspective and consider other dimensions that can serve to isolate a population. Language can be one such obstacle yet speaking the language may not be enough to reach these group members. Differing cultural values and norms may complicate the perception that mental health services are suitable, desirable or necessary. Issues of race and class can serve as societal constructs which relegate racially- and economically-marginalized groups from access to complete therapeutic services. Effectively, these issues create chasms across which clinicians would need to bridge in order to reach and be efficacious in these communities.
Therefore, as someone goes through the process of deciding their direction, this process will be more challenging with the contemplation of a remote community as your working population. In these cases, specificity may not be in the best interests of such communities. A more broad-based repertoire of therapeutic expertise may be more suitable. Most psychology graduate programs require that you designate a specialty which usually means the selection of a research direction in a specific mental illness such as autism or depression. Yet for those who choose to work with remote communities, it may be a better course of action to select a segment of the general population such as adolescents, children or couples then tailor your education on the mental health issues of these populations. Certainly, it won't address all the needs of these communities yet it may help create a wider network of therapeutic services. This expansion of your knowledge base beyond the parameters of a specialty will hopefully better anticipate and address the possible therapeutic needs of remote communities.
As clinical psychologists, there are additional solutions that would continue the facilitation of mental health treatment to these communities. The development of better understanding about the cultures, social values and norms as well as religious ideals would assist in providing inroads to remote communities. As familiarity grows, this may prompt a practitioner's willingness to modify therapy or create culturally-sensitive treatment plans would ensue. Also, contact may assist in the education of the community about mental health treatment which in turn may assist in breaking some misconceptions about such services. Patience, honesty, sensitivity and willingness may work to build the bridges into remote communities. What may appear at first glance to be a professional challenge, may in actuality be the opportunity of a lifetime.
