Avoiding Pitfalls in The RANZCP Psychotherapy Case – Dr Neil Jeyasingam
Dr. Neil Jayasingam is a former research scholar of the Institute of Psychiatry (Sydney) and Institute of Psychiatry (UK) and specializes in phenomenology and personality disorders in the elderly. In public practice, he is the in–patient clinical lead for an old–age psychiatry service, as well as ECT Clinical Director. He is also the Binational New South Wales Representative for the Faculty of Old Age Psychiatry, a Foundation Accredited Member of the Royal Australian and New Zealand Psychotherapy Faculty, a Clinical Lecturer with Sydney University, and Senior Lecturer with Western Sydney University.
He is also the founder of Profectus Psychiatry.
Author Quotes
Now – the last bit. Remember, I [the examiner] need to find you interesting. You need to make it easy for me to pass you, you need to show me that you’ve learned something, you need to make me think that you are safe, and you really need to avoid any spelling or grammatical mistakes.
If there are really major problems, you may have to think about rewriting your case from scratch which is not such a hard deal. In your regular public work, you currently do about 4000-8000 words per week anyway.
I think it’s a good idea to try to start doing your psychotherapy case in the beginning of second year [residency], and I think it’s important to try getting psychotherapy supervision at least half way through your first year.
Summary
In this section of the presentation, Dr. Jayasingam covers the review process and how to submit your case.
He provides examples of why examiners fail cases and emphasize the importance of good language skills and a polished case report. 
He provides details of how to resubmit highlighting the importance of addressing feedback and recommends the use of professional editing services to help with language difficulties for candidates with English as an additional language. 
He moves on to discuss how to improve your clinical acumen through the experience of psychodynamic therapy and has a discussion session with the audience to conclude this presentation.
Questions include the recommended time between writing up your case and reflecting on the material and the optimum number of sessions needed with the patient.
Take-Home Points
- Mark your case using the marking scheme and give it to your supervisor/s for comments before submitting it.
- Poor language skills are a common reason for failing the psychotherapy case write-up.
- Make sure you respond to the feedback and consider a professional editor for proofreading and editing your case, especially if English is your second language.
Quiz
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