About Us
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According to the statistics of the Ministry of Interior, Taiwan has become an aged society in 2018 with the elderly population over 14% of the total population. With ages, people develop multiple diseases. The top five health problems for the elderly include multiple chronic diseases, polypharmacy, cardiovascular diseases, osteoarthritis and geriatric syndrome.
According to the literature, in Taiwan, 80% of the elderly have at least one chronic disease, and 68% have two and more chronic diseases. For people over 65 years old, 52% have hypertension, 20% have hyperlipidemia and diabetes, 22% have osteoporosis, and 7% have dementia, which speaks volume for the importance of gerontology. The frequently seen symptoms of geriatric patients are called geriatric syndrome, which includes frailty, fall, incontinence, depression, cognitive impairment and malnourishment, etc.
With these phenomena in mind, Shuang Ho Hospital establishes the department of geriatrics and gerontology to shoulder the responsibilities of clinical services, teaching and researches in this area. We have inaugurated our geriatric outpatient clinics and geriatric ward, which provide inter-specialty and inter-disciplinary health care. The geriatric team integrates clinical specialties, such as nephrology, neurology, cardiology, chest medicine, family medicine, urology, orthopedics and psychiatry, and nurses, psychologists, social workers, nutritionists, physical therapist and pharmacists. Through the operation of the geriatric team, we hope to provide elder patients with comprehensive geriatric assessment and reconcile their medical problems with polypharmacy so as to meet the unique needs of the elderly.