Chicago Doctors Brush Up on Parkinson's Via Videos

Because physician education is of critical importance to the Parkinson’s Disease Foundation (PDF), Dr. Christopher Goetz, Director of the Movement Disorder Program at Rush Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center in Chicago, one of the PDF’s leading center grant recipients for Parkinson’s research and patient care, recently organized an afternoon symposium for movement disorder specialists in the Midwest area. “In a busy urban center,” commented Dr. Goetz, “colleagues do not have a ready venue for meeting and sharing their knowledge and questions with one another.” With this fact in mind, Dr. Goetz, with an educational grant from PDF provided by Glaxo-SmithKline, staged a clinical symposium on October 19 that may well serve as a national model for the future.

Chicago has several medical schools and university hospitals as well as a large community-based hospital system. Dr. Goetz invited colleagues interested in movement disorders to come to Rush for the afternoon and instructed them to bring one videotape of an interesting patient. Each attendee accepted the responsibility to present the video case; pose one primary question to the rest of the group; and lead a discussion that incorporated all participants. Some of the medical conditions studied included Parkinson’s disease, other parkinsonian disorders, dystonia, tremors, and dyskinesias. All of the participating clinicians unanimously agreed that the venue selection was invaluable and that the structure of the symposium fulfilled an important need within the clinical arena. “Increasing physician interaction, discussion, and exchange of ideas is at the core of the patient care process,” summarized Dr. Goetz at the conclusion of the meeting.

PDF has received additional funding from GlaxoSmithKline to test the applicability of the program model for other U.S. cities. Also, a second pilot symposium is scheduled to take place in the spring of 2003. Potential city sites under consideration include New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Phoenix.