Edinburgh Geriatric Tutorial
 

This story by Katie Poorman first appeared in the January 2004 edition of Rounds
 

   No, they didn’t meet Sean Connery, but it was a worthwhile trip nonetheless. Last summer, OU-COM students Sunyata Austin and Candice Flaugher traveled to Edinburgh, Scotland, to participate in the Charles J. Cannon Edinburgh Geriatric Tutorial. On Oct. 31, they returned to OUCOM from their CORE site at St. Vincent Mercy Medical Center in Toledo to discuss their four-week stay among the Scots.                                 

Austin, a fourth-year student, focused her presentation on end-of-life care.“What health-care providers try to do in Edinburgh is develop a supportive network for the patient and family in the hospital and also help try to help transition them out into the community so when patients leave they won’t have any worries or concerns,” Austin said. “That’s their goal, so the patients can spend their remaining time with their families and enjoy their lives to their fullest.”

Sunyata Austin

   Austin explained that there are major differences in palliative care as practiced in Edinburgh compared to in Ohio. For example, nurses at St. Vincent sometimes visit patients in their homes but only to change bandages or administer medication. In Edinburgh, palliative care nurses do much more.

   “Edinburgh has community palliative care nurses who visit people in their homes and solely focus on palliative medicine,” Austin said. “They’re there to develop a relationship with the families and the patients to understand their physical, psychosocial and financial needs.”

   Flaugher, also in her fourth year, discussed the differences between Edinburgh and Ohio in regards to home health-care for the elderly. She said that many nursing homes in Edinburgh have been forced to close.

   “They have new standards. Unfortunately, they don’t have adequate funding or the staffing, and they can’t build new facilities right now because there’s no land available,” Flaugher said. “We take the land that we have here for granted.”

   Flaugher also said that she believes many elderly patients are better off in their own homes than they are in nursing homes. “Independent living is really the best option that we have for the elderly, both here and in Edinburgh, because people tend to do better in their own homes,” she said.               Candace Flaugher

   Every year, OU-COM selects two students to participate in the Edinburgh Tutorial during the summer of their third year. The tutorial is hosted by the University of Edinburgh, one of the first institutions to classify geriatric medicine as a distinct entity. Each student selected is sponsored by the Department of Geriatric Medicine/ Gerontology, and is required to write and present an essay comparing health care for the elderly in Edinburgh and Ohio.

   Barbara Pfeiffer, M.P.H., geriatrics administrator and Edinburgh Tutorial coordinator, says the department provides a stipend that supports most of the cost of the tutorial for each student.

   “Two years ago we started a fund-raising campaign from past tutorial participants,” Pfeiffer says. “The students have enjoyed it so much that the past participants have been very generous in helping to support future students.”

   Pfeiffer adds that the tutorial is a great learning experience for every student who participates. “The program always makes a strong impact on the participants as they learn about a different culture and a different system of health-care delivery,” she says.

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