Donald W. Reynolds Program on Aging & Quality of Life

Virginia Commonwealth University

Advanced informatics and distance learning techniques are being employed by VCU’s School of Medicine to improve the training of faculty, medical students, residents and community physicians in geriatrics. CD-ROMs will provide interactive instruction. The VirginiaGeriatrics.org website offers practical advice on common problems through "Geriatric Quick Consult" plus will contain hundreds of archived seminars. The school’s 688 medical students have a major increase in hours devoted to geriatric topics using new curricular materials, including a series of interconnected cases which are in development. Internal medicine residents will double their required involvement in geriatrics. Training for other specialties, including orthopedics, neurology, psychiatry, emergency medicine, and general surgery will be enhanced by focusing on acute geriatric care. A new medical education effort in geriatrics will target 500 practicing physicians each year who are also community instructors for the school.