Sex and the Geriatrician

Guest Blog

By C. Kosowan, LL.B., B.A

Sex and the Geriatrician

The Schulich School of Medicine may prove to be Windsor’s defining institution. It provides Windsor with an opportunity to address the North American shortage of geriatricians that is surfacing as a concern not just in medical circles, but in communities everywhere.

“Fewer and fewer people are entering into geriatric medicine training programs,” lead author Susan J. Torrible, MSc, MD, from the Geriatric Assessment and Consultation Program at Windsor Regional Hospital in Ontario, Canada, told Medscape. “This situation coupled with a large number of physicians retiring from the specialty in the next decade will result in a crisis — too few geriatricians for an aging population.

A geriatrician is a physician who specializes in the care of older adults. According to the Stanford Centre on Longevity, population aging is accelerating and while age mix varies by region, in the more developed countries of the world, the number of old people will steadily increase and the number of children will decline. By 2015, old people will outnumber children: this has already occurred in several countries, including Japan and Germany.

Why would anyone want to be a geriatrician? Undoubtedly because all your patients look like this (tongue firmly in cheek)…

   

Italian actress Sophia Loren, still sizzling at 72, is the star of the 2007 edition of the famously racy Pirelli calendar

Physicians who choose geriatrics note that their practices are challenging and rewarding because they use an interdisciplinary approach that is designed to treat the whole person.

Patients are treated not only according to their physical needs, but their social and emotional needs as well. This type of practice far exceeds simply diagnosing a physical problem and treating it.

Geriatricians collect information about patients’ lifestyles, community, family, and their entire medical history. The goal of a geriatrician is to maximize the patient’s ability to be as independent as possible.

The need for Windsor to re-define itself, the vast need for geriatricians and a fledgling School of Medicine create a perfect opportunity for Windsor to emerge as the locus of research and treatment on ageing and lifestyle. Not only can we create an industry, we can transform our city into a place that caters to retirees’ active lifestyles.

We could be the creators of new, living lightly initiatives………..narrowing streets and lowering speed limits to accommodate our Chrysler Peapods, creating the new “longevity” cuisine, re-defining fashion for the woman with curves… and there’s a fortune waiting for the person who finally invents a walking shoe that is comfortable, but not ugly.

Some of you may have seen the ad campaign ( http://www.retirehere.ca/ecom.asp? ) aimed at retiring seniors. Some of you may be thinking of retiring here yourselves. The goal of the Windsor/Essex Active Retirement Community Initiative is…

To create a new and vibrant ‘green’ economy by attracting the affluent and active 50-plus market, to attract investment, create new jobs, and revitalize the real estate market throughout Windsor-Essex by building on the region’s growing development of active, retirement luxury properties and services, and by promoting the unique location, diverse lifestyle and quality amenities of its nine communities.

This is great copy, but there is more to living than staying in your house. What we need is a community-wide focus to develop facilities that serve the needs of this coveted demographic.

If we don’t provide it, they will simply go elsewhere.