The American Geriatrics Society: What We're Doing
Key Accomplishments In 2008

AGS continued to expand the geriatrics knowledge base by furthering basic, clinical, and translational elder health research via:

• The American Geriatrics Society's 2008 Annual Scientific Meeting, the premier conference on elder health and healthcare for older adults. More than 600 geriatrics experts presented studies and led sessions and workshops concerning geriatrics research, clinical care and education during the meeting. More than 2,600 geriatrics professionals attended.
  
  
• The Journal of the American Geriatrics Society, which was recently named one of the most influential medical and biology journals of the century by the Special Libraries Association. JAGS editors received and reviewed more than 1,300 articles and published 528 articles and letters in 2008.
  
  
• Three Leading Awards Programs that advance research and support clinicians and scientists working to improve healthcare for older adults. With the generous support of the John A. Hartford Foundation and The Atlantic Philanthropies, the AGS and its Foundation for Health in Aging (FHA) awarded nearly $3 million to 15 noted physician-researchers -- recipients of the 2008 T. Franklin Williams Scholars Award, the 2008 Dennis W. Jahnigen Career Development Scholars Awards, and the 2008 Hartford Geriatrics Health Outcomes Research Scholars Awards.
  
  
• "Idiopathic Fatigue of Aging," the 5th annual "Bedside-to-Bench" research conference sponsored by the American Geriatrics Society, the National Institute on Aging, and the John A. Hartford Foundation. The conference brought together leading experts from basic scientific and clinical perspectives who explored topics related to fatigue in later life, including energy utilization, the relationship between mitochondrial function and muscle, central processes, disease, and performance measurement. Conferences in the ongoing Bedside-to-Bench series focus on important but poorly understood problems of aging identified by clinicians at "bedside."

AGS continued to spearhead efforts to increase the number of healthcare professionals employing the principles of geriatrics when caring for older adults through:

• Geriatrics at Your Fingertips, 10th Edition (GAYF), a concise and invaluable resource for those caring for older adults. GAYF was fully revised and updated for 2008-2009.
  
  
• The John A. Hartford Foundation-funded Geriatrics-for-Specialists Initiative (GSI), which brings together 10 surgical and related medical specialties in an effort to improve care for older adults undergoing surgery. Among other things, the GSI awarded grants to 24 medical school and hospital residency programs in 2008. Twenty medical schools and residency programs received two-year $40,000 Geriatrics Education for Specialty Residents (GSR) grants and four schools and residency programs received inaugural GSR Dissemination Grants (GSR-DG) of $25,000 each to further disseminate findings from research supported by earlier GSR grants.
  
  
• Case-Based Geriatrics Review: 400 Questions and Critiques from the Geriatrics Review Syllabus an evidence-based, clinically relevant self-study tool designed to help primary care clinicians promote the optimal health, functioning, and well-being of older adults. Case-Based Geriatrics Review also meets the needs of those preparing for board examinations in internal medicine, family medicine, and geriatric medicine, and serves as a teaching resource for educators.
  
  
• Doorway Thoughts: Cross Cultural Health Care for Older Adults, Volume III, the latest in AGS' series of guides designed to help healthcare professionals provide ethnically and culturally appropriate care to an increasingly diverse population of older patients. Doorway Thoughts III examines how religion influences health care decision-making in the US.

AGS continued to recruit physicians and other healthcare professionals into careers in geriatrics through:

• Free AGS memberships for trainees AGS continued to offer free memberships to trainees in all disciplines in 2008.
  
  
• Mentoring The AGS continued to sponsor effective local and national mentoring programs, pairing trainees with established geriatrics leaders. Through the 2008 Annual Meeting's Residents Mentoring Program alone, leaders in the field mentored 59 residents and junior faculty.
  
  
• Working collaboratively with the Association of Directors of Geriatric Academic Programs (ADGAP). With staffing from AGS, ADGAP promotes and advances geriatric education and research and collaborates with the Society on public policy advocacy, geriatrics training, and aging research initiatives. ADGAP promotes interest in geriatric education and research through several programs including: the Chief Resident Immersion Training Program which expanded in 2008; the Hartford Geriatrics Leadership Development Program; and the Status of Geriatric Workforce Study. In late 2008, the AGS received a grant from the John A. Hartford Foundation to establish the Geriatric Workforce Policy Study Center, which will build on the work of the longitudinal study (see below). ADGAP also promotes interest in geriatric education and research through the Geriatrics Education Coordinating Center and POGOe.

AGS continued to advocate for public policy that ensures older adults access to quality, cost-effective healthcare by:

• Working with the John Hartford Foundation and The Atlantic Philanthropies to establish the need for the Institute of Medicine's (IOM) groundbreaking study examining the US healthcare workforce's readiness to care for an aging nation. Released in April 2008, the resulting IOM report, Retooling for an Aging America; Building the Health Care Workforce, concluded that the nation's workforce is too small and unprepared to care for the growing number of older adults in the US. The report has generated considerable interest in the media and in Washington and continues to prompt and inform legislative proposals aimed at implementing the report's recommendations for "retooling" the workforce. Five AGS members sat on the IOM committee that drafted the 2008 report
  
  
• Working with lawmakers and Congressional staff on legislation aimed at ensuring older adults access to quality healthcare. In 2008 AGS:
  
  
  • Worked with Sen. Barbara Boxer's (D-CA) staff on draft language for the Caring for an Aging America Act. This legislation, which was subsequently reintroduced in 2009, would establish loan forgiveness programs and other support for healthcare providers entering the field of geriatrics.
    
    
  • Worked with Rep. Rosa DeLauro's (D-CT) staff on the Geriatrics Loan Forgiveness Act, which was also reintroduced in 2009. AGS successfully urged the inclusion of new language in the bill that would extend loan forgiveness to a wide array of geriatrics health providers.
    
    
  • Reviewed and endorsed the Retooling the Health Care Workforce for an Aging America Act, legislation proposed by Senate Aging Committee Chairman Herb Kohl (D-WI) and Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), that would implement key recommendations of the IOM Report
    
    
  • Continued to advocate for passage of the Geriatric Assessment and Choric Care Coordination Act and a Medicare demonstration project based on the act. The Society worked closely with Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-AR) and Rep. Gene Green (D-TX), sponsors of the act, which would fill a gap in traditional Medicare by covering geriatric assessment and care coordination for beneficiaries with at least two chronic conditions, including dementia. In 2009, Sen. Lincoln, Rep. Green and Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) reintroduced the legislation, renamed the RE-Aligning Care Act.
    
    
  • Endorsed legislation sponsored by then Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Rep. Diana DeGette (D-CO), to enable allied health professionals, community health workers, and informal caregivers to participate in Geriatric Education Center training programs.
    
    
  • Successfully advocated for continued funding of Title VII Geriatrics Health Professions Programs and Title VIII Nursing Workforce Development Programs -- essential training programs and initiatives -- in Fiscal Years 2009 and 2010.
    
    
  • Advocated for Congressional reauthorization of Title VII programs. Congress last reauthorized these programs in 1998, for five years. The reauthorization process would provide an opportunity to expand and refine the programs to address current and projected needs, including those outlined in the IOM report.
    
    
  • Successfully campaigned to block a scheduled a 10.6% cut in Medicare payments to physicians mandated by Medicare's controversial Sustainable Growth Rate formula. Congress rescinded the cut a day before it was slated to take effect. According to an American Medical Association survey, 60% of physicians reported that they would have had to limit the number of new Medicare patients they saw had the cut gone through.
  
  
  
• Improving healthcare for older adults by working with federal agencies including:
  
  
  • The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). AGS worked with Thomson Reuters to develop practice recruitment materials for CMS's Patient-Centered Medical Home demonstration project, an initiative aimed at improving care for complex patients. Recruitment for this demonstration project is scheduled to begin in 2009.
    
    
  • The National Institute on Aging (NIA). The AGS, an executive committee member of the Friends of the NIA, continued to work to raise public awareness of and to educate policy makers about the critical work of the NIA. Among other things, the Society wrote letters to President-elect Barack Obama, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Senator Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) underscoring the importance of including adequate funding for the National Institutes of Health and the NIA in the economic stimulus package.
    
    
  • Responding to requests for comments from legislators and government agencies. "Swat Teams," created by AGS and staffed by members ready to respond quickly to requests for information and comment on various bills and policy statements, responded to 20 such requests in 2008.
    
    
  • Forging partnerships with other likeminded advocacy groups AGS Deputy Executive Vice President Nancy Lundebjerg, MPH, was elected co-convener of the Eldercare Workforce Alliance by the alliance's 28 participating organizations. Established in late 2008 with funding from the Atlantic Philanthropies and the John A. Hartford Foundation, the coalition -- of organizations representing healthcare professionals, direct-care workers, and family members who care for older adults -- was created to advance the recommendations in the IOM's Retooling for an Aging America: Building the Healthcare Workforce.
  
  
  
• Launching the Geriatric Workforce Policy Study Center (GWPS) With a three-year, $500,000 grant from the John A. Hartford Foundation, AGS established the GWPS Center in December 2008. The center's mission is to generate information about the geriatrics workforce that, among other things, supports policy and advocacy efforts aimed at expanding the workforce and improving the quality of care older adults receive. The center's work builds on ADGAP's Longitudinal Status of Geriatrics Workforce Study, which has provided essential, up-to-date information concerning geriatrics training, the geriatrics workforce, and related issues since 2000.

AGS continued to raise public awareness of older adults' healthcare needs -- including the need for high quality, culturally-sensitive geriatric healthcare -- by:

• Raising public awareness of the risks that falls pose to older adults During AGS' 2008 Annual Meeting in Washington, DC, AGS members volunteered for an FHA-sponsored event that screened more than 150 older adults for increased risks of falling. Volunteers also distributed information about the dangers of falls and how to prevent them.
  
  
• Making headlines! In 2008, AGS and the FHA secured 938 mentions in the media - with such outlets as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, US News and World Report, USA Today, and National Public Radio. That number was up from 547 mentions in 2007.