Providence Health Care

Geriatric Medicine is the specialty branch of medicine that focuses on the health and well-being of older adults, and is dedicated exclusively to providing high-quality, person-centered care for older adults, especially those living with frailty.

A Geriatrician is an expert in the “5Ms” for older adults:

Mind including Maintaining mental activity,   assessing and helping managing dementia and delirium, evaluation and initial treatment of depression;

Mobility including Maintaining the ability to walk and/or maintain balance, preventing falls and other types of common injuries;

Medications including reducing polypharmacy, de-prescribing (the opportunity to stop unnecessary medications), Prescribing treatments exactly for an older person’s needs and Helping build awareness of harmful medication effects

Multi- Complexity (Frailty) including  helping older adults manage a variety of health conditions that impact daily functioning, assessing living conditions when they are impacted by age, health conditions, and social concerns

“Matters Most” including coordinating advance care planning, helping manage goals of care and making sure that a person’s individual, personally meaningful health outcomes, goals, and care preferences are reflected in treatment plans

The PHC Division of Geriatric Medicine has a wide range of services spanning both of the acute sites within Providence Health Care.  We continue to innovate and build our services, striving to provide the very best in wrap around multi-disciplinary care for older adults.  Our services support patients and families as they transition from the emergency department, to acute medical wards, to specialized rehabilitation units and finally back to the community with outpatient follow up and community outreach services.  We continue to recruit division members that have expertise in trainee education, research and clinical subspecialties including cognition/dementia care, falls, perioperative medicine, and continence care.