GRAND FORKS (AP) - The University of North Dakota medical school says gifts and pledges totaling nearly $5.3 million from a Seattle radiologist will be used for a specialist in geriatrics.

The gift from Dr. Eva Gilbertson, who died last month, is the largest ever given directly to the medical school through the UND Foundation, officials said.

Gilbertson was a native of Maddock who attended the UND medical school in the late 1930s. The UND Foundation said she was the only woman in her class.

UND medical school Dean H. David Wilson said the gift will fund an endowed chair of geriatrics and could lead to an entire department of geriatrics.

North Dakota has the nation's third highest per capita population of people over 65, and ranks first per capita in population over 85, Wilson said.

"Our Center for Rural Health is among the biggest and the best in the nation because we're a rural state," Wilson said. "We're also a state with a large elderly population."

After attending UND, Gilbertson went on to study medicine at Temple University in Philadelphia and completed her residency in radiology at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn.

The medical school had planned to announce the gift during Gilbertson's lifetime, but she died before details could be completed, Wilson said.

UND said Gilbertson earned degrees from UND in 1938 and 1939, and became the first woman radiologist in the state of Washington. She successfully operated her own radiology practice in Seattle for more than 30 years, a statement from the school said.

"From our earliest conversations with Dr. Gilbertson, her concern was always that the aging population in this country has special health care needs and that medical students nationwide are not receiving the special training required to serve them," Blanche Abdallah, director of advancement and alumni relations for he medical school, said in the UND statement.

Gilbertson set up a private foundation through her estate to provide long-term funding for geriatric education, Abdallah said.