Healthy Aging

The Division of Geriatric Medicine responds to the needs of frail patients from the moment they enter the emergency room until they are discharged from the hospital. Its teams work closely with the various MGH divisions to provide these patients with care appropriate to their age and health status. Two teams of physician/nurse pairs are assigned to this group of patients on a continuous basis, one in the emergency room and the other on the wards.

To meet the needs of our aging community, the Division of Geriatric Medicine has created a day hospital and five clinics at the MGH, each focused on specific problems that affect seniors:

• Memory Clinic
• Skill and Ability Clinic
• Polypharmacy Clinic
• Pain Clinic
• Fall Assessment Clinic

The Falls and Mobility Assessment Clinic’s team works tirelessly on researching risks related to gait and falls in the elderly. Its objective is to prevent falls and their recurrence, thereby avoiding emergency room visits and hospitalization. 

Thanks to the generosity of our donors, the Falls and Mobility Assessment Clinic has been equipped with a cutting-edge electronic walkway system for the measurement of temporal and spatial parameters of gait. Among these parameters, the walking speed, the cadence and the weight on each leg will be measured, giving specialists the ability to draw links between variations in gait and cognitive slowing. 

Your continued support allows the Foundation to fund initiatives like the Falls and Mobility Assessment Clinic and offer care that is ever-better adapted to the needs of our ageing population. 

In addition to treating the elderly and training medical students and residents in our specialized approach to senior care, we promote the use of this method by healthcare workers across the board so they can develop the basic skills needed to tailor their care-giving to the specific requirements of the elderly and frail.

SAFE – Senior adult fitness exercises 

Did you know that one in three people above 75 years of age fall every year? Physical pain, reduced mobility, and a fear of falling renders already vulnerable seniors more susceptible. This results in serious injuries, such as assorted fractures or head trauma in 10% of these falls. According to Dr. José A. Morais, Director of the Division of Geriatrics, this is a very real public health issue. In response, he and his team piloted a comprehensive new senior exercise program to counter this serious problem.

Adapted low impact exercises can help reduce falls by as much as 50%. The significance of this cannot be understated. That is why this specially designed series of home-based exercise videos for senior adults is ideal. It allows them to build their:

• strength,
• balance,
• flexibility, and
• endurance

– the foundation for a well-balanced program aimed at enhancing their overall mobility. This is a tangible way to help them improve their quality of life, help reduce the risk of falls, and importantly, and keep them safely out of the hospital. This will also go a long way to minimizing the correlated impact on our health care system.

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