British Geriatrics Society

I knocked on the door. From behind the entrance Alan appeared weary and yet relieved to see a familiar face. I sat down with him and revisited our meeting a week prior when he came to see me complaining of widespread joint pain and weight loss for which no cause had been identified by the hospital specialists. He was known to have Rheumatoid Arthritis amongst multiple other conditions and was attending to discuss what could be the cause as he was now becoming frail, tired and perplexed at why he wasn’t improving.

One of the key challenges of being a geriatrician is to be able to gain a sense of the wider perspective of ageing. Although geriatricians and gerontological nurses are the gerontologists who have the most day-to-day contact with older people, this is often with those who are frail and living with multimorbidity.

New research from King’s College London found that people living with dementia experience higher levels of unplanned hospital admissions towards the end of life compared with the period immediately following their dementia diagnosis. The study found that 40% of all unplanned hospital admissions after a diagnosis of dementia took place in the last year of life.