Division of Geriatric Medicine: http://www.med.upenn.edu/gerimed/
The Department of Medicine offers a unique combined Geriatric-Rheumatology Fellowship. The three-year experience is comprised of a year of clinical geriatrics and training in clinical epidemiology and health services research, a year of clinical rheumatology and an opportunity to explore scholarly geriatric-rheumatology research projects in the third year. Flexible programs can be developed.
Clinical components of the first year geriatric experience include activities at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania (HUP), the Philadelphia Veterans Administration Hospital (VAH) and the Presbyterian Medical Center (PMC), as well as consultative services, geriatric evaluation, home care and nursing home programs, and outpatient practices. Weekly conferences feature discussions of patient management and visiting professor rounds. A course on the Fundamentals of Medical Research provides a background in the principles of clinical research and statistics. Other research conferences introduce the fellow to additional aspects of health services research. During this year, fellows also begin their rheumatology training with conferences and outpatient management experiences.
Fellows cover inpatient rheumatology services at HUP and the VAH during the clinical year in rheumatology on a rotating basis. Every third month is spent entirely in the outpatient setting. Throughout all three years of the geriatrics-rheumatology fellowship, fellows attend one rheumatology clinic per week at the VAH and alternate weekly at HUP rheumatology clinic and at the geriatrics-rheumatology clinic at Ralston House\. Regular conferences include weekly patient management sessions and rheumatology grand rounds; joint conferences with the Department of Orthopedic Surgery, the Department of Radiology, and the Division of Allergy and Immunology; and monthly journal club.
In the third year, fellows can pursue in depth research projects at the interface of Geriatrics and Rheumatology. These include projects that deal with issues of clinical care and teaching, health services, rehabilitation and epidemiology. Mentors and collaborators may be selected from the Divisions of Rheumatology or Geriatrics or from other entities in the University of Pennsylvania Health System including the Dental School, the Wistar Institute, the Graduate Immunology Group, the Center for Clinical Epidemiology and Biostatistics, and the Institute on Aging.
