Developing capability and resilience

Improving geriatric care through a new innovative training programme for medical students

Despite the UK’s ageing population, there is a lack of training in geriatric care for undergraduate medical students. In collaboration with colleagues, Dr Grace Pearson and Dr Emily Henderson, both at the University of Bristol, have developed a new undergraduate curriculum that delivers more effective training on how to care holistically for older people. They set out to evaluate the training so see whether it can inspire more students to pursue careers in geriatric medicine.

A helping hand with insulin injections: training Healthcare Support Workers to support older people with diabetes

It’s best practice for people with diabetes to look after their health by injecting their own insulin. As people get older, however, they are likely to have other conditions that make this harder or unsafe to do. Dr Karen Stenner, from the University of Surrey and Principal Investigator of the CINDI Project, set out to evaluate the emerging practice of registered nurses delegating insulin injections to Healthcare Support Workers in community nursing teams. Could this alleviate workload pressures and bring benefits to patients and nursing teams alike?