Geriatric psychiatry training: a brief clinical rotation

Burgeoning interest in geriatric psychiatry has created a challenge of optimally fitting geriatric content into already crowded psychiatric residency curricula. The authors review general considerations in geriatric psychiatry training and describe a brief clinical rotation for working with the elderly. The brief rotation is not presented as the ideal way of imparting geriatric psychiatry skills, but as an effective use of limited time to improve one's approach to the older patient. The clinical rotation enables the resident to learn more about psychiatric issues in later life, as well as to acquire a better perspective on other parts of the life cycle and on other aspects of psychiatry.