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Evolution of the Geriatric Curriculum in General Residency Training

Recommendations for the Coming Decade

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Abstract

As the number of older Americans increased in the twentieth century, training programs added geriatrics to their teaching and clinical experiences. The advent of added qualifications in geriatrics through board examination and the accreditation of geriatric residency (fellowship) programs brought further recognition of the geriatric imperative. Yet curricular requirements for experience with old age mental illness remain minimal. Reduced support for graduate medical education dictates that general—rather than geriatric—psychiatrists will continue to provide the majority of specialty mental health services to older adults. The authors review the emergence of geriatrics in general residency training and present recommendations for further evolution.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Division of Geriatric Psychiatry, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science, Albert Einstein College of Medicine, Montefiore Medical Center, 111 East 210th Street, Bronx, NY, 10467, USA

    Gary J. Kennedy M.D. (Professor and Director) &  Alessandra Scalmati M.D. (Assistant Professor)

  2. Department of Psychiatry, State University of New York Medical Center, Buffalo, USA

    Marion Zucker Goldstein M.D. (Associate Professor)

  3. Department of Psychiatry, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, Canada

    Colleen J. Northcott M.D. (Assistant Professor)

  4. Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, USA

    Mustafa Husain M.D. (Associate Professor)

  5. University of Nevada School of Medicine, Las Vegas, USA

    Rena Nora M.D. (Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Chief of Psychiatry)

  6. Las Vegas Medical Center, Las Vegas, USA

    Rena Nora M.D. (Clinical Professor of Psychiatry, Chief of Psychiatry)

  7. Louisiana State Medical School, New Orleans, USA

    Kenneth M. Sakauye M.D. (Professor of Clinical Psychiatry and Director of Geriatrics)

  8. Department of Psychiatry, John A. Burns School of Medicine, University of Hawaii, Manoa, USA

    F. M. Baker M.D., M.P.H. (Professor)

Authors
  1. Gary J. Kennedy M.D.
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  2. Marion Zucker Goldstein M.D.
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  3. Colleen J. Northcott M.D.
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  4. Mustafa Husain M.D.
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  5. Rena Nora M.D.
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  6. Kenneth M. Sakauye M.D.
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  7. F. M. Baker M.D., M.P.H.
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  8. Alessandra Scalmati M.D.
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Gary J. Kennedy M.D..

Additional information

This work was supported, in part, by the American Psychiatric Association’s Council on Aging Work Group on the Geriatric Psychiatry Curriculum Guidelines for General Residency Training. Members included Marion Zucker Goldstein (Ex Officio Chair, Council on Aging), Mustafa Husain (Member, Council on Aging), Gary J. Kennedy (Working Group Chairperson), Rena Nora (Member, Council on Aging), Colleen J. Northcott (APA/BW Fellow), Kenneth Sakauye, and F.M. Baker (Consultants). The authors also acknowledge the communications of Drs. Ewald Busse, Charles M. Gaitz, Charles Reynolds, Lissy Jarvik, James Lomax, Paul Mohl, Eric Pfeifer, the Education Committees of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry and the American Psychiatric Association, and many others.

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Kennedy, G.J., Goldstein, M.Z., Northcott, C.J. et al. Evolution of the Geriatric Curriculum in General Residency Training. Acad Psychiatry 23, 187–197 (1999). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03340054

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