Advanced Lingo

A dietitian asked me what I thought about the term “advanced age.” She’d used it in a charting note, explaining why her estimates for a patient’s food needs were “decreased” compared to standards.

As she explained, “standard” doesn’t match everybody—and generally, dietetic needs go down as age goes up.

My thoughts: “Advanced age” seems like a sensible and useful term in medicine—as long as the medical community doesn’t start using it as an excuse to suggest care isn’t needed when it actually is.

In fact, in a world without ageism, “advanced age” would come with another word: Congratulations!

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