UF psychiatry resident wins fellowship for cultural assessment work

A University of Florida psychiatry resident recently was awarded a one-year American Psychiatric Association minority fellowship for his work developing an assessment tool to help doctors understand how cultural factors can influence patients’ presentation and doctor-patient communication.

Rafael Ruiz, M.D., a fourth-year resident, recognized that traits used to assess presentation, such as body language and speech patterns, vary from culture to culture and might lead to misdiagnoses if physicians are uninformed about a patient’s background. Ruiz has begun designing a curriculum for the assessment tool, known as a cultural formulation, and hopes to have it ready for use before he completes his residency in June.

“My goal is to create a tool that will be included in the training program for every psychiatry resident,” Ruiz said. “When you know something about a person, you can be more empathic. In the doctor-patient relationship, that engagement needs to happen to make things work easily.”

As part of the fellowship, Ruiz serves on the APA Committee on Government Relations, where he works to educate lawmakers and promote solutions to public mental health issues.