SVPA-ASMAP-ASAP at the EFPT Forum 2025 in Maastricht

From 10 to 14 June 2025, a delegation of Swiss psychiatric trainees took parte in the EFPT Forum held in Maastricht, Netherlands. The European Federation of Psychiatric Trainees (EFPT) is the umbrella organization representing national psychiatric trainee associations in over 30 European countries. Once a year, its forum gathers representatives from across the continent to discuss key topics in psychiatric education, international collaboration, and advocacy.

The EFPT Forum is not only a platform for policy-making and structured working groups, it is also a vibrant community that promotes leadership, scientific exchange, and solidarity among psychiatry trainees. The theme of this year’s forum, “Trainees in Leadership: Shaping the Future of Psychiatry Training,” resonated deeply with the Swiss delegation, as it closely reflects national efforts to involve trainees in shaping their education and professional development.

🗣️Impressions on the 2025 EFPT Forum in Maastricht: Holding the reins in psychiatry – who’s in charge ?

The members of our association who took part in the EFPT Forum have summarized below their impressions of the days spent in Maastricht.

Zeliha Cepik Ulukorkut, Bern

“Attending the EFPT Forum in Maastricht was an enriching and inspiring experience. As a young psychiatrist, I felt deeply honoured to be part of such a significant event that brings together early-career psychiatrists from across Europe.
Beyond the academic content, what stood out to me the most was the strong sense of community. Being together with so many passionate young professionals from different countries made me feel that we, as young psychiatrists, can truly make a difference. Whether through shared goals, engaging discussions, or simply spending time together, the forum reminded me that we are not alone in our challenges—and that we are stronger when we support each other.
I return from Maastricht not only with new knowledge but also with motivation and a sense of belonging in this growing international network. This experience has strengthened my commitment to contributing actively to the field and supporting my peers along the way.”

Iliya Petkov Peyneshki, Bern

“The EFPT Forum in Maastricht was my first international forum. It allowed me to meet many interesting people, learn about the different ways in which psychiatry residents are shaping their future throughout Europe, and gain new insights into how we can optimise our training. I would definitely recommend that all psychiatry residents try to get involved in their local or national association, as this helps you bond with other motivated colleagues, develop leadership skills and contribute to the future of this exciting specialty in many ways. So, be brave and make sure you hold the reins of your professional future!”

Widian Laoun, Lausanne

“Someone once told me that the EFPT Forum exists in its own timeline and dimension like a bubble outside the routine of everyday life. I didn’t truly understand what that meant until I experienced it for myself in Maastricht, 2025.
For me, it felt like stepping into an alternate world. A world where people from across Europe, come together to connect, share, inspire, and bond, and often meeting for the first time, yet feeling as though they’ve known each other forever. It’s a unique kind of experience, the kind that makes you come back home and wonder: Was that real, or just a dream that I dont want to end.
Back home, I find myself longing to return, to once again share my psychiatric reflections, to listen and learn from the diverse perspectives shaped by others’ cultures, life paths, and training environments. I realize how far the mind can wander, grow, and open when you truly engage with others from different backgrounds. How it lights up with joy when it encounters ideas, and people, so full of kindness, curiosity, and openness.
This, to me, is what my first EFPT was all about.”

Anna Mavromanoli, Zurich

“The EFPT in Maastricht has been a great experience harmonizing knowledge and real-life experience and connecting trainees and young psychiatrists around Europe. It has enabled the exchange of current practices in the training process in different countries and provided new insights on future actions and perspectives. The EFPT forum is highly recommended to everyone who wants to have a long-lasting impact in clinical practice.”

Violette Corre, Lausanne

“Each year at the EFPT Forum I am amazed at how different and alike the day to day of psychiatry residents across Europe can be. Amidst vastly different health care systems, cultural, political and economical climates, we see the same patients, take the same decision. Science has evolved to bring us here – a shared knowledge that can be applied in Georgia, Switzerland, France and Turkey – and we all want to learn more.
We are chasing our future – trying to learn as much as we can, in an unending field of knowledge, trying to grasp what our forebears observed and described in detail, while keeping the time on the 5 minute encounter with a patient in a night shift; shifting between deep thinking and quick recognition of patterns, clinical reflexes.
Maybe in your first visit to the forum, it’s hard to believe that you can shape anything, that you can have an influence. How can you provide good psychiatric care without a supportive social system? If the stigma around mental health is still so strong, that people don’t consult? If the the present is so accelerated and the future seems so bleak, that mindful breathing feels like yet another burden?
The first speaker of the Forum, Prof Nils Mulder, president of the Dutch psychiatric association, boldly said: Psychiatry is politics and politics is psychiatry. EFPT’s President Mette Konings then reminded us in her touching opening speech the power that a glass of water, offered to a patient in distress, with empathy and authenticity, can have.
Here at the Forum, in a safe space, we learn to organize. And among the fun and icecreams, it does feel like getting ready to hold the reins. “