The UK has seen many significant developments during the last 30 years
in geriatric psychiatry, with emphasis on multi-disciplinary working
and on the integration of services for the elderly. Accompanying these
changes has been a growing public consciousness of the psychiatric di
sorders of later life and of the needs of old people and their carers.
With a huge increase this century in the proportion of very elderly p
eople, care of the elderly has achieved greater recognition in the med
ical training of both generalists and specialists. Greater emphasis al
so is being given to gerontology, both social and biological. In this
paper the authors examine recent developments in medical education in
the UK and show how changing approaches to medical training are shapin
g developments in geriatric psychiatry education. They describe recent
innovations in both teaching styles and assessment methods and consid
er how developments in Computer Aided Learning can be applied to the t
eaching of geriatric psychiatry.