“The program is valuable on many levels,” says Rebecca Boswell, PhD, Director of Princeton Center for Eating Disorders and Administrative Director of Psychiatric Services at Princeton Medical Center. “We benefit from having bright students helping us move our clinical research initiatives forward, our team members build mentorship experience, and the interns gain exposure to the clinical environment and an opportunity to hone their interests.”
Interns shadow therapists and observe group therapy before participating in research. According to Sana Asifriyaz, a Princeton University senior majoring in Psychology, this approach has provided a better understanding of the patients behind the research.
Asifriyaz was able to extend her internship into the fall to continue her work on various projects, which have included administering surveys on variables that affect treatment outcomes and examining correlations between target weights and patient weights at various stages of recovery. With guidance from Dr. Boswell, she also applied for and received a Princeton University community partnership grant to conduct a scoping review of treatment outcomes in patients with longstanding eating disorders.
“We hope to shine a better light on novel treatment approaches and raise awareness that there’s still hope for substantial progress even in patients with a longer duration of illness,” says Asifriyaz.
She notes that the internship experience has better positioned her to pursue a graduate program focused on research.