BLOG – Experiences Summerschool INTERDEM Academy

The INTERDEM Academy summer school: “build for care: building capacity for psychosocial research” was held on the 24th – 28th August in Maastricht.
The summer school started with 21 elevator pitches which was a great way to get a quick and short impression of the work and studies of all participants. After this the lectures started and proved to be inspiring with many ideas and suggestions for our own research. The course was structured according to the phases of the MRC framework, from development to implementation of the intervention. These different phases were presented in an interesting way by the professors: Gerjo Kok, Rose-Marie Dröes, Ruud Kempen, Martine Roes, Martin Orrel, Trudy van der Weijden and Myrra Vernooij-Dassen. Together with the focus lecturers from prof. Caroline van Heugten, dr. Astrid van der Schot, dr. Marjolein de Vugt, dr. Sebasitaan Köhler and prof. Frans Verhey this contributed to an profound building of our knowledge related to current issues in the field of dementia. It was striking that all those people were very open and supportive to our questions.

‘The lecturers were very interesting, helpful and well prepared’ (course participant).

Part of the course consisted of interactive workshops with our fellow colleagues. This way it was possible to learn from each other and to discover different perspectives of the problems each one of us encounters within our own research.

‘The exchange of our projects in sub groups was very helpful and supporting’ (course participant).

Overall it was a great experience and offered the opportunity to meet European colleagues in the field of dementia care. It was very fruitful to exchange knowledge and share experiences with each other on both issues regarding the content and implementation of psychological interventions as well as issues on research methodology. Also, this week seeds were planted for future collaboration between some of us, a surprising added bonus!

And last, but not at least, the weather was enjoyable, just as our location in Maastricht along the rivier, the Maas, and … for sure all of us gained weight because of the daily delivered lovely Maastrichter fruit pie: vlaai!

Thank you for organizing this Summerschool!

On behalf of all participants, Yvonne Kerkhof & Petra Boersma (PhD students VU University, Amsterdam)