Goals
Our program aims to graduate fellows with:
High levels of clinical skills in the assessment and management of:
- Dementias, including vascular and neurodegenerative dementing illnesses.
- Prodromal stages of disease including mild cognitive impairment
- Focal and lesional neurobehavioral syndromes.
- Major neuropsychiatric disorders.
- Cognitive, emotional and behavioral consequences of neurological and medical disease.
Expert knowledge of core literature related to:
- Behavioral neurology
- Neuropsychology
- Neuropsychiatry
- Cognitive neurobiology
- Understanding of research methodology in both clinical and basic science research through exposure and didactic teaching.
- Scholarly experience tailored to the fellow’s preferences and career tract.
- Great interpersonal and communication skills to counsel, console, inform, educate and relate to patients and their family.
These aims will be achieved by practice-based learning, participation in case conferences, direct mentoring, didactic lectures, clinicopathological correlation sessions and research seminars.
General Competencies
- Competent and compassionate care involving the patient and the family in decision-making.
- Interpretation of principal testing modalities including imaging, genetics, biomarker studies and neuropsychological assessment.
- Administration of screening cognitive instruments and familiarity with neuropsychological test types.
- Promotion of health outcomes by pursuing preventative and lifestyle measures.
- Awareness of the high-risk of psychiatric comorbidity and appropriate treatment or referral.
- Treating the patient-caregiver as a dyad and being sensitive to the possibility of caregiver distress.
- Mastery of clinical semiology of cognitive disorders.
- Understanding of biological processes underlying cognitive, emotional, and behavioral impairment.
- Understanding the neurochemical basis of drug therapy in behavioral neurology and an ability to appropriately prescribe the medication.
- Good working knowledge of literature and common paradigms.
- Demonstrated commitment to completion of professional responsibilities.
- Understanding and abiding by ethical principles, including understanding capacity.
- Understanding of cultural factors that play into cognitive disorders.
- Communication with patients and family in a non-technical manner.
- Ability to present patient histories to colleagues in a concise and efficient manner.
- Written communication with colleagues, patients and family, including clinical notes and letters.
- Understanding the broader context of any disease in terms of social, economic and biological terms.
- The ability to call on appropriate system resources to mitigate harm, improve quality of life and reduce co-morbidities.
- Demonstrated ability to assimilate new information into the diagnosis and management of cognitive disorders.
- Demonstrate the ability to seek information on his or her own to complement the base of knowledge.
- Willingness to learn from non-neurologists on the road to clinical competence.