i
ntcKcom
duke univcRsity mc6ica.l ccateR
VOLUME 21, NUMBER 13
MARCH 29, 1974
DURHAM, NORTH CAROLINA
Med Center Advisory Body
Board Meeting Today
//V TH£ COMPUTER ROOM—Qn. Ramm (left) and Gianturco outlined ways by
which modern connputer technology may aid the aged in a recent issue of THE
GERONTOLOGIST. (Photo by David Williamson)
The Board of Visitors—the medical
center's major outside advisory body on
ongoing programs and new ideas-is
meeting here for a full-day session
today.
The annual meeting brings together
nationally recognized specialists in
fields including government, finance,
philanthropy, medicine, nursing and
education for a review and preview of
medical center activities.
Henry Rauch of Greensboro, vice
chairman of the University Board of
Trustees, is chairman of the Board of
Visitors.
Today's morning session began with
a report on plans for a graduate
program in nursing education by Dr.
Ruby Wilson, dean of the School of
Ors. Ramm and Gianfurca Suggest Ways
By Which Computers May Aid the Aged
"It's the Pepsi generation. Coming at
'cha. Going strong. You've got a lot to
live, and while you're living, you belong."
So runs the television soft drink
commercial. Brief scenes of young people
riding bicycles in the rain, shooting rapids
on the Colorado River, scaling nxjuntains
in the Rockies or racing downhill on skis.
Today in the media the emphasis is on
youth, and the aged are largely ignored.
Advertisements which feature the senior
citizen usually highlight the merits of a
particular brand of laxative, dye to
darken silver hair or a
hemmorrokl-shrinking ointment.
The grandmother who used to give us
cookies from her kitchen is now
portrayed as a smuggler of toilet paper.
There's little wonder then that the
aged in the age of the computer and the
moonwalk feel neglected when the
company has asked them to retire, their
grandchildren are bearing young of their
own and the rest home looms as an
ever-increasing possibility.
Two Duke scientists, one a computer
expert and the other a psychiatrist, have
joined forces to make professionals in
aging research aware of advances in
technology which may give tomorrow's
senior citizen a new lease on life.
In a recent issue of THE
GERONTOLOGIST, a scholarly
publication for professionals who
specialize in problems of aging. Dr.
Dietolf Ramm, assistant professor of
computer sciences and information
sciences in psychiatry, and Dr. Daniel T.
Gianturco, associate professor of
psychiatry and assistant professor of
community health sciences, outlined
ways by which the computer may keep
the elderly out of institutions and also
keep them independent.
"Overcoming some, or most, of their
problems will help the senior members of
society feel that they are still viable
because, even more than death, the aged
fear dependency and infirmity.
Ultimately, they want to retain their
feeling of usefulness in this world," the
two wrote.
Ramm and Gianturco cited the needs
of the aged as safe transportation, easily
accessible housing with minimal
maintenance and cost, protection from
rising crime, good nutrition and health
care and economical communication with
family and friends.
Now that computers and their
components can be made at a fraction of
their original cost, their increasing use
may bring to reality projects which
presently seem far fetched.
Consider these possibilities—
-An automated, self-propelled
personal vehicle in which all one needs to
do is designate the destination, sit back
and enjoy the ride. While development of
such a vehicle remains for the future,
horizontal elevators and moving sidewalks
are already in use.
—A telephone which includes a picture
screen. The Bell Telephone System is
presently experimenting with two-way
video phones on a small scale, and their
experience will be helpful when mass
marketing is begun. The availability of
more personal communication ^ould
help senior citizens fight the attendent
loneliness after their children have left
home.
—Medical monitoring in the home. An
electro-mechanical device which dispenses
medications at the proper time and
(Continued on page 2)
Dr. Vernon Weckwerth To Deliver
Annual Harriet Cook Carter Lecture
The coordinator
of the Office of
Continuing Hospital
and Health Care
Education at the
University of
Minnesota will
deliver the annual
Harriet Cook Carter
Lecture here
Thursday, April 4.
Dr. Vernon E.
Weckwerth will
speak on "Quality
Assurance in Patient
Care."
The lecture will be in the Ann M.
Jacobansky Auditorium in the School of
Nursing beginning at 4:30 p.m., and will
be part of the three-day Spring Nursing
Program beginning that day.
The Carter Lectureship was established
in 1969 to honor Harriet Cook Carter,
who was a nurse, a co-founder^ of the
Duke Hospital Auxiliary dnd an active
Weckwerth
Durham civic leader. Mrs. Carter, who
was wife of Dr. F. Bayard Carter, retired
chairman of obstetrics-gynecology, died
in 1968.
Dr. Weckwerth, who yarned his Ph.D.
at the University of Minnesota, also holds
a professorship in the Program in Hospital
and Health Care Administration at the
School of Public Health there.
Presiding at the Thursday session will
be Dr. Ruby Wilson, c|ean of the School
of Nursing. Weckwertjh will be introduced
by Miss Wilma Minniear, director of
nursing service in Duke Hospital and a
professor in the School of Nursing.
On Friday morning, from 8:30-noon,
Weckwerth will be available for informal
discussion in the Administrative
Conference Room off the Hospital
Director's Office.
The afternoon program, beginning at
1:30 in the Jacobansky Auditorium, will
center on presentation of the Thelma
Ingles Scholarly Papers. Presi^g will be
(Continued on page 2)
Nursing, and a report on medical and
allied health education by Dr. Thomas
D. Kinney, director of medical and
allied health education.
Also on the morning program was
Dr. Ewald Busse, chairman of the
Department of Psychiatry, who
reviewed developments in his
department from 1953 to the present.
Other medical center programs
reviewed this morning were the Center
for the Study of^Aging and Human
Development by Or. Eric Pfeiffer,
professor of psychiatry, and Dr. Walter
Obrist, professor of medical
psychology,; outreach projects in the
community and the state by Dr.
Stephen Mahaley, associate professor of
neurosurgery and associate director for
graduate medical education; and the
Medi-Data system by Robert Winfree,
assistant hospital director.
On the afternoon program were
progress reports on the new Duke
Hospital project by Dr. Jane Elchlepp,
assistant vice president of health affairs
for planning, and the Comprehensive
Cancer Center by Dr. W. K. Joklik,
chairman of the Department of
Microbiology and Immunology.
The session was to conclude with
tours of the Eye Center and the Alex H.
Sands Building, both of which have
opened since the board's last visit here.
For three new members this will be
their first board meeting at Duke. They
are:
—Karl D. Bays, president and chief
executive officer of American Hospital
Supply Corp.
—Dr. Earl W. Brian, a native of
Raleigh who received both his
undergraduate and medical educations
here and who is now California's
Secretary of Health and Welfare.
-Dr. C. Henry Kempe, professor
and former chairman of the Department
of Pediatrics at the University of
Colorado.
Other members of the board.are:
—Edward H. Benenson, president of
the Benenson Management Co., Inc., of
New York City.
—Dr. John A. D. Cooper, president
of the Association of American Medical
Colleges in Washington.
— Dr. Kenneth R. Crispell, vice
president for health sciences at the
University of Virginia in Charlottesville.
—Dr. Harry Eagle, associate dean of
the Albert Einstein College of Medicine
at Yeshiva University in New York City.
— James R. Felts Jr., executive
director of the Hospital and Child Care
Sections of the Duke Endowment in
Charlotte.
—Dr. Loretta Ford, dean of the
School of Nursing at the University of
Rochester.
- —Dr. John H. Knowles, president of
the Rockefeller Foundation in New
York City and a university trustee.
—Dr. Alexander Leaf, chairman of
the Department of Medicine at Harvard.
— Raymond D. Masher of the
(Continued on page 3)