Insurance and care provider icare NSW has announced icare Foundation’s second batch of psychiatry fellowships.

Established in February 2019 with funding of $2.2 million, the Australian first initiative aims to enhance specialised skills for psychiatrists working with people who have sustained a brain injury.

New fellows Bernard Myers, Kiran Lele, and Abirami Ratnagopal will be based at Royal North Shore Hospital, Westmead Hospital and John Hunter Hospital supporting the inpatient, community, and rehabilitation brain injury teams. Another fellow is due to start later this year to be based between Liverpool and Wollongong Hospitals. They will join Ralf Ilchef, of the Royal North Shore Hospital and Jodi Cartoon, the first fellow to have completed icare’s psychiatry fellowship.

“Mental health conditions are commonly experienced by people with brain injury and can often require specialist management,” said Jacqueline Scott, service development manager of care innovation and excellence at icare. “70% of icare’s Lifetime Care participants have a brain injury and 50% of those have a mental health condition. By formalising the training of psychiatrists, these fellowships will increase the capacity of specialist mental health services in NSW, to better support people with a brain injury.”

The icare Foundation Psychiatry Fellowships are run in partnership with University of Sydney’s Brain and Mind Centre, the Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatry, and the associated local health districts.