The New Trend, Geriatric Surgery: Considerations in Geriatric Surgery

Abstract

Current demographic trends reveal we are experiencing an aging population. Life expectancy has extended, individuals are living longer, and electing to have surgery in their older age. Often older patients are more medically complex when compared to their younger counterparts, this places them at a higher risk for developing a complication after surgery. In addition, older patients may have a poor tolerance to anesthesia making their surgical care challenging. Complications after surgery can lead to longer hospital stays, readmissions back into the hospital, and can disrupt the patients’ quality of life. Presurgery screening and identification of any modifiable health concerns are the keys to prevention of bad outcomes after surgery. Surgeons, anesthesiologists, and the surgical team must be aware of the unique needs of the aging population to understand specific measures that can be taken to keep patients safe. Information that was presented in this chapter was obtained from clinical experience and an extensive literature search. A literature search was performed using search engines such as EBSCOhost, MEDLINE with Full Text, CINAHL Complete, Health Business Elite, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Cochrane Clinical Answers, E-journals, Google search engine, and Full-text Finder.