The geriatrics fellowship program is designed so that each fellow has the opportunity to achieve the knowledge, professional attitudes, and practical experience required of a physician caring for the elderly patient. Each fellow will participate in and will be closely supervised by trained faculty during the year-long fellowship.

Fellows will gain experience teaching nurses, allied health personnel, medical students and residents in both a formal and an informal setting. Close association with Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation, Neurology and Geropsychiatry accredited training programs at UT Southwestern give geriatrics fellows an unparalleled opportunity to round out their training.

Throughout the year fellows will treat elderly patients with a variety of chronic illnesses. They will see patients in an acute-care hospital (Parkland Memorial Hospital), in a long-term care institution (VA hospital), in an ambulatory care setting (various outpatient clinics), and during consultation services (Parkland, VA).

Longitudinal clinical experience with patients is an integral part of the program. At the beginning of the fellowship year, fellows will rotate at the Dallas VA Medical Center where they will be assigned nursing home patients for whom they will have primary responsibility throughout the ensuing year. These patients will be chosen with respect to medical, ethnic and social diversity to ensure a well-rounded experience.

In addition throughout the year fellows will rotate in one-month blocks in the following services:

• Acute inpatient and consult service
• Geriatric evaluation and management (three months)
• Geropsychiatry
• Neurology
• Palliative care/ethics
• Parkland Senior HouseCall program
• Physical medicine and rehabilitation
• Two elective rotations

On the educational front, fellows attend an eight-week core lecture series that covers key topics from normal aging processes and geriatric syndromes to health maintenance to the molecular basis of aging. Speakers are drawn from the geriatrics faculty, internal medicine faculty, basic science researchers and allied healthcare professionals. Throughout the year fellows attend a monthly journal club as well as the weekly Geriatrics Grand Rounds series.