Abstract
A Modest Proposition to align Geriatrics and Long Term Care Medicine
Highlights
10 million Americans have long-term care needs,[1] including 2 million community-based elders who suffer impairments akin to those of the nation's 1.6 million nursing home residents.[2]
In light of projections regarding the growth of the elderly population in the coming decades, those over 85, the size of the elderly population requiring long term care who have complex chronic conditions will likely double in 30 years.[3]
If we assume that there are about 10 million complex geriatric patients, and that they average 15 physician visits per year, were there as many as 10,000 US geriatricians, each with 1000 such patients, that would translate into 47 patient visits per working day!!! That is considerably more than the 20 minutes the average older patient spends with a physician these days
Summary
10 million Americans have long-term care needs,[1] including 2 million community-based elders who suffer impairments akin to those of the nation's 1.6 million nursing home residents.[2]. For geriatricians to be the primary care physicians for all complex, chronically ill older patients, the number of geriatricians would have to triple AND nurse practitioners or physicians' assistants would still have to be doing the majority of regular primary care to make this model viable.
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