A course in dementia for third-year medical students

Outcomes of an annual 1-week intensive course, entitled "Dementia With Focus on Alzheimer Disease (AD)," were studied. The Division of Geriatric Psychiatry created this "selective" in 1990 for third-year medical students of the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences in an effort to enhance geriatric education. In 1997, a survey was mailed to all participants of the past 6 years whose addresses were available (N = 50). Fifty nonparticipants, matched by graduation year, received a similar survey. The respondent participants in the course (N = 25) reported significantly more confidence in their assessment and diagnosis of dementia, awareness of community resources for demented patients, and familiarity with issues of caregiver burden than the control subjects (N = 27). The authors conclude that small-group, brief, intensive but comprehensive, and diverse learning experiences in AD had favorable effects on the self-reported knowledge base of the course participants.