Caring for older adults demands more than knowing how to treat individual diseases. Aging can change physiology, reduce functional reserve, alter the way illness presents, increase medication risk, and make clinical decisions more complex when several conditions exist at the same time.
Practical Geriatric Medicine Textbook provides a clinically focused approach to understanding these challenges. It brings together the essential principles of aging physiology, multimorbidity, frailty, functional assessment, treatment burden, and individualized decision-making so readers can approach older patients with greater structure and confidence.
Rather than viewing each diagnosis separately, the book emphasizes the relationships between disease, function, cognition, mobility, independence, medications, physiologic reserve, and personal priorities. Readers are encouraged to consider not only what treatment is medically possible, but what is most appropriate for the individual patient.
Inside this textbook, readers will explore:- Age-related physiologic changes and their clinical consequences
- Frailty, vulnerability, and declining physiologic reserve
- Multimorbidity and the challenges of competing conditions
- Functional assessment and changes in activities of daily living
- Medication burden, treatment risks, and complex care decisions
- Mobility, cognition, independence, and quality of life
- Individualized treatment goals for older adults
- Clinical reasoning when guidelines, risks, and patient priorities compete
- Practical approaches to organizing care around the whole patient
A major focus is the importance of function in geriatric medicine. Changes in mobility, independence, cognition, or daily activities may provide critical information about a patient's health and can influence treatment choices just as strongly as laboratory results or individual diagnoses.
The textbook also addresses one of the defining realities of geriatric practice: older patients frequently live with several conditions at once. Managing these patients requires careful consideration of interactions between illnesses, medications, functional ability, expected benefits, potential harms, and the patient's own goals. This broader perspective helps readers move beyond disease-by-disease thinking toward more realistic clinical decision-making.
Designed for medical students, residents, physicians, clinicians, and healthcare professionals involved in the care of older adults, this 502-page reference offers enough depth for serious study while maintaining a practical focus on the clinical problems that matter most.
When aging, illness, function, and treatment choices intersect, better care begins with seeing the complete patient rather than a collection of diagnoses.
Build a stronger foundation in geriatric medicine and develop a clearer, more individualized approach to the complex decisions involved in caring for older adults.