Geriatric medicine training in a family medicine residency

While the need for training programs in geriatric medicine is widely recognized, there are substantial obstacles to developing such training. Obstacles include shortage of faculty members and negative attitudes toward geriatrics on the part of students. For the past two years, family medicine residents have participated in a required rotation in geriatric medicine at the Duke University Medical Center. The program has been successful as measured by regular monthly evaluations of the resident on the rotation, resident acceptance, requests by other learners in the university to participate, and career choices of graduates of the program.