Medical schools prepare for "silver tsunami"
Yahoo News, January 28th, 2007
Now, Brown and other U.S. medical schools are plugging
geriatric courses into their curricula and adding specially
trained faculty members as they respond to an imminent boom in
the number of older Americans and the need to better understand
how to properly care for the elderly.
The U.S. Census Bureau projects the number of elderly
Americans will nearly double to 71 million by 2030, leaving one
physician trained in geriatric care for every 7,665 seniors.
The first members of the Baby Boomer generation, so named
for the explosion in births in the years after World War Two,
turn 65 in three years. In addition, people are living longer
than ever.
"The first ripples of the silver tsunami are lapping at the
shores of our country, but there is not a coordinated or
strategic response taking place in America," said Richard
Besdine, who is director of the geriatrics division at Brown
University medical school in Providence, Rhode Island, and past
president of the American Geriatrics Society.
Geriatrics has never been a field of choice for young
doctors. Elderly care doctors are paid less than most other
physicians and surgeons and the aged can be hard to treat.
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