Special Interest Groups & Sections

Fellows-in-Training Section
Co-Chairs: Sahiba Singh, MD & Maria Alejandra Arroyo Vélez, M.D.

Medical & Surgical Specialties Section
Co-Chairs: Lauren Ferrante, MD, Una Makris, MD, & Christopher Carpenter, MD, AGSF

Nurses Section
Chair: Margaret Wallhagen, PhD, GNP-BC, AGSF, FGSA, FAAN

Pharmacists Section
Co-Chairs: Megan Carr, PharmD, BCPS, BCGP & Anushka Tandon Pharm.D., BCPS,BCACP

Residents Section
Organized by resident members of the AGS Resident Activities Subcommittee & Faculty Advisors Niharika Suchak AGSF, MBBS, FACP, MHS and Glenda Westmoreland, MD, MPH, AGSF

Social Workers Section
Chair: TBD

Students Section
Organized by student members of the AGS Student Leadership Council & Faculty Advisor Lisa Strano-Paul, MD

Teachers Section
Chair: Lisa Vargish, MD

Women in Geriatrics
Co-Chairs: Lisa N. Miura, MD; Lee Jennings, MD, MSHS

Sections are open to AGS members. To join a section, you can click a section name and select "join community", contact the section co-chair, or attend a section event during the AGS Annual Meeting.

Achieving Health Equity Among Diverse Older Adults (AHEAD)
Co-Chairs: Jane Jih, MD, MPH, MAS & Benjamin Han, MD, MPH
Mission: The mission of the SIG is to bring together AGS members with an interest in promoting health equity and reducing health and healthcare disparities among diverse older adults in order to: (1) promote health equity initiatives at AGS; (2) develop programming and educational materials for AGS members; (3) create interdisciplinary relationships and mentor colleagues with an interest in health equity initiatives; and (4) cultivate collaborations in health equity-focused research and quality improvement initiatives among older adults.

Acute Care
Co-Chairs: Caitlin Jones, MD & Priscilla Yee, MD 
Mission: To improve hospitalization outcomes for older adults through improvements in clinical care, dissemination of research findings, and promotion of health professional education.

Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drug Use (ATOD) Among Older Adults
Co-Chairs: Kimberly Beiting, MD & Justina L. Groeger, MD, & Benjamin Han, MD, MPH
Mission: A satellite interest group of the Alcohol, Tobacco, and Other Drug Use (ATOD) Interest Group of Society of General Internal Medicine (SGIM), the ATOD Among Older Adults SIG has a special focus on older adults. The purpose of ATOD Among Older Adults SIG is to address the dramatic increase in older adults with unhealthy substance use and substance use disorders. This SIG brings together an interdisciplinary group of professionals with clinical, educational, and/or research interests in the use of alcohol, tobacco, and other drug use by older adults.

Cancer and Aging
Co-Chairs: Sindhu Kadambi, MD, MS, Kohei Horiuchi, MD & Helen Bae, MD
Liaison to the Palliative Care SIG: Imran Ali, MD, MS, MPH
Fellows Representative: Evgenia Granina, MD, MBA
Mission: To assemble clinicians and investigators interested in improving the care of older adults with cancer. Activities range from disseminating the latest evidence in geriatric oncology, collaborating on research studies and clinical innovations, and discussing the integration of geriatrics into local oncology practices. A fundamental goal of this group is to find ways to more widely implement newly adapted treatment guidelines created in conjunction with the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) and the Cancer and Aging Research Group (CARG).

Cardiovascular Diseases and Aging
Co-Chairs: Manish Kumar, MD & Shaista Ahmed, MD
Mission: The mission of the Cardiovascular Diseases and Aging Special Interest Group is to provide an official forum for AGS members who are dedicated to providing high-quality and safe care for older adults with cardiovascular diseases. The members will engage in activities (1) disseminating the up-to-date evidence in geriatric cardiology, (2) collaborating on various research projects, (3) discussing the current challenges and solutions in care for older adults with cardiovascular diseases in real-world practice, and (4) networking nationally and internationally. The forum is open to any AGS members from diverse backgrounds. 

Care Transitions
Co-Chairs: Jessica Wright, PA-C
Mission: To improve outcomes for vulnerable older adults moving across different healthcare settings through the better execution of care transitions. We assemble geriatricians and other geriatrics professionals with a common interest in improving care transitions through education, quality improvement, and research. We strive to serve as a resource to develop educational sessions at AGS Annual Scientific Meetings, and serve as AGS' main forum for discussion, collaboration, and advocacy on care transitions issues.

Clinical Care for Homeless Older Adults 
Co-Chairs: Diane Lynn Chau MD & David Picella, NP   
Mission: To provide a forum where issues that impact homeless aging older adults are presented and discussed, and geriatrics healthcare professionals can interact to find and expand access to care for homeless older individuals; To address the growing homeless epidemic by educating, promoting awareness, and assuring quality healthcare evidence and data to support homeless geriatrics care. To accomplish our mission, we: (1) disseminate knowledge regarding the homelessness and poor health; (2)
develop relationships with a broad range of other groups (social welfare, financial, public, academic) to aid in our mission and collate solutions for assuring adequate healthcare for homeless older adults; (3) promote clinical practices and address practice gaps that will improve the health status of older adults who live without homes or are at risk of homelessness.

Clinical Research in Dementia
Chair: Noll Campbell, PharmD, BCPP, FASCP
Mission: To bring together AGS members who are dedicated to advancing the health care of older adults living with dementia by advancing clinical research in geriatrics across disciplines and care settings; To disseminate interdisciplinary, evidence-based clinical knowledge about the management of dementia in older adults. 

Clinician Wellness 
Chair: Magdalena Bednarczyk, MD 
Mission: The Clinician Wellness Special Interest Group is open to anyone with an interest in improving clinician well-being in order to address growing concerns related to clinician burnout. The goal is to provide information, tools and resources for decreasing burnout utilizing a holistic approach pertaining to professional, personal, financial and physical wellbeing, with the ultimate goal of helping physicians rediscover meaningful, mission driven work within their organizations, and if necessary, provide tools to redefine success. 

Dementia Care and Caregiver Support
Chair: Maria D'Souza, MD, MPH
Mission: To provide a forum for AGS members who are dedicated to providing clinical care for individuals living with dementia and support for their caregivers, in order to discuss clinical questions, exchange information and resources, and explore ideas for improving our individual and collective practice, towards advancing optimal dementia care. 

Dual and D-SNPs
Chair: Chuck Pu, MD, FACP, CMD
Mission: To improve quality and outcomes of health care and maximize independence among low-income older adults; to bring together geriatrics healthcare professionals dedicated to the care of these older adults, disseminate practical solutions and innovative geriatrics team care models, and advocate for public policy change to better address the needs of this population.

Elder Mistreatment
Co-Chairs: Julia Hiner, MD & Carrie Rubenstein, MD
Mission: To improve the lives of older people affected by elder mistreatment. Members include national leaders in research and advocacy, as well as clinicians and educators who are active in developing curriculum for healthcare learners. We advocate for elder abuse initiatives and serve as a networking group for colleagues.

Ethnogeriatrics 
Chair: Olga Olivares-Herrera, MD, CMD
Mission: Open to anyone with an interest in the relationship between aging, ethnicity, clinical practice, and research, we work to identify challenges and practical solutions to providing appropriate care to different cultures and ethnicities in our diverse country.

Faith, Religiosity, Spirituality and Aging  
Chair: Hawa Abu, MD, PhD, MPH & Douglas Lane, PhD
Mission: The Faith, Religiosity, Spirituality, and Aging Special Interest Group aims to create a collaborative space for geriatric and non-geriatric clinicians and researchers to explore the influence of faith, religiosity, and spirituality on the well-being and health outcomes of older adults. Our goal is to translate these insights into clinical practice while building meaningful partnerships with faith-based organizations to support older adults throughout their lives. 

Family Physicians in Geriatrics
Chair: Erik J. Lindbloom, MD, MSPH
Mission: To discuss and act on issues of concern to family physicians, family medicine fellows, and family medicine residents caring for older adults. We communicate with several of the other family medicine organizations, such as the American Academy of Family Physicians and the Society of Teachers of Family Medicine.

Geriatric Academic Career Award (GACA)
Co-Chairs: Mary Bonnet; Evan Henricks; & Kristen Martin
Mission: The GACA SIG seeks to promote the career development and longitudinal professional growth of GACA awardees.

Geriatrics Consultative Services
Chair: Ella H. Bowman, MD, PhD 
Mission: Open to anyone who provides or is interested in providing geriatric medicine consultative services across all care settings, this group promotes learning from other practitioners how geriatrics consultative services are provided in various clinical settings. Our discussions focus on what services are in demand; the types of older adults we are asked to see; various collaborative efforts with other services; billing processes and concerns; efforts to incorporate geriatrics teaching within the consultative setting; and the types of problems we encounter as a group. 

Geriatric ED (GER-ED)
Chair: Saket Saxena
Mission: The Geriatric Emergency Department (GED) Special Interest Group brings together all health professionals interested in caring for older adults in Emergency Departments. We review how to create and sustain new models of geriatrics care in the context of GED accreditation from the American College of Emergency Physicians (ACEP). We discuss successes and challenges of GED programs. Please join us to explore growing opportunities to advance the care of older adults in GEDs. 

Geriatric-Surgical Co-Management 
Co-Chairs: Nadia Mujahid, MD 
Mission: Brings together clinicians and researchers interested in clinical and academic perspective on surgical co-management. We share ideas, promote our work, network, collaborate, and provide a safe environment for clinicians to discuss the complexities and intricacies of co-management from creating a business case to promoting team-based care

Geroscience 
Chair: Dr Lolita Nidadavolu, MD, PhD & Dr John Newman, MD, PhD
Mission: Brings together AGS members from varied backgrounds who share a common interest in efforts to leverage our understanding of basic aging processes towards the discovery, validation and implementation of interventions to help promote health, function, and independence in late-life.

Group Medical Visits (GMVs) for Older Adults
Chair: Deborah S. Lee, MD
Mission: To provide a collaborative space for geriatrics clinicians who are conducting group medical visits (GMVs) to deliver effective counseling and care for older adults. Priorities include: effectively billing for GMVs for financial sustainability, engaging trainees in the design and implementation of GMVs, disseminating successful curricula for adaption by practices/providers lacking geriatrics expertise, using GMVs to reduce social isolation, and exploring the role of GMVs as a community engagement/service tool.  

Health Systems Leadership (HSL) in Geriatrics
Co-Chairs: Anna Chodos, MD, MPH & Ardeshir Hasmi, MD, FACP, AGSF
Mission: To explore principles of leadership, management, and systems transformation as they apply to the growing need for geriatrics in health systems and present strategies to accomplish this. Our goals are to educate AGS members about these principles, highlight successful work in HSL, present opportunities for training in HSL, develop workshop leadership challenges, and form a community to help develop new health systems leaders in geriatrics.

Healthy Aging
Co-Chairs: Emily Johnston, MPH, PhD & Kamal Wagle, MD, MPH, CMD, AGSF
Mission: To promote healthy aging initiatives at AGS; to develop presentations, symposia, and educational materials for AGS members; to encourage research in healthy aging; to act as liaisons with other organizations promoting healthy aging; and to identify and promote ways that AGS members can promote healthy aging among their patients and among populations of people.  

Home-Based Primary Care (HBPC)
Co-Chairs: Melissa Dattalo, MD & Emma Williams, PharmD
Mission: To ensure every chronically ill, medically complex patient who is homebound and in need has access to quality HBPC that results in a profound improvement in medical outcomes, patient and family experience, and healthcare spending. To accomplish our mission, we:  (1) Provide awareness of the value and rewards of HBPC to AGS members; (2) support AGS members dedicated to advancing the field of HBPC; (3) collaborate and discuss HBPC models of care, best practices, and key metrics to measure performance and quality of care.  

Hospital Elder Life Program (HELP) / Delirium Prevention
Chair: Lyn Weinberg
Mission: Mission: To allow all current and potentially interested AGS CoCare^®: HELP sites to come together to hear the latest updates about the program and delirium prevention, as well as network and discuss successes and challenges anywhere in the planning or implementation process. AGS CoCare^®: HELP is an innovative model of hospital care designed to prevent delirium and functional decline and to improve overall quality of hospital care for older persons. The program has been demonstrated to be both effective and cost-effective, with the potential for large cost savings.

Information Technology Issues
Chair: Sean Huang
Mission: To establish a venue for members with an interest in Information Technology as it applies to geriatrics. We see Electronic Health Records (EHR) as a means for improving medical care by reducing error rates, improving efficiency, augmenting communication, facilitating optimal reimbursement, and decreasing expenses. We seek to provide information, support, and an organized center for coordinating information and resources to optimize the use of EHRs in senior healthcare environments like ambulatory and long-term care healthcare settings. 

Additionally, we are interested in the use of computerized records to facilitate transitions of care from one setting to another. Beyond the interest in improving communication and health information exchange, we reflect interests in telemedicine and computerized assessment/biotechnology advancements, such as monitoring vital signs, laboratory testing, and imaging from remote locations.

International Activities
Co-Chairs: Niharika Suchak, MBBS, MHS, FACP & Savitri Ramdial, MD, CMD
Mission: This SIG brings together AGS members who have an interest in the development of international initiatives in geriatrics care and education. As the older adult population continues to grow globally, there has been an increasing demand for health and social-service systems tailored to older adult needs. We promote awareness of global trends in aging and healthcare issues in older adults across continents and international borders. We emphasize optimizing care of older adults around the world by enhancing networking and establishing partnerships. This can translate into improved geriatrics care and education, greater use of technology to conduct didactic sessions with participants from multiple countries, long-term international collaborations for models of care and geriatrics education, and increased involvement and representation of AGS members in international geriatrics conferences and organizations.

Interprofessional Education and Practice (IPE / P)
Co-Chairs: Todd James, MD, FACP & Rachel Jantea, MD, MS
Mission: To explore how broad health professional interest in teamwork is changing health education and practice. While geriatrics has long recognized the importance of teams, this has not been a widely recognized focus of health education or practice until recently. Interprofessional education refers to "two or more professionals learn[ing] about, from and with each other to enable effective collaboration and improve health outcomes."

Junior Faculty Research Career Development
Chair: James Deardorff
Vice Chair: Hillary Spangler
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Mission: To facilitate and foster the research career development for junior faculty members, fellows, and students. We discuss research interests, academic career development, career choices, job opportunities, and a range of other topics pertinent to junior faculty development.

Make It Safe To Grow Old! Accountable Care Communities for Frail Elders
Chair: Joanne Lynn MD, MS, AGSF
Mission: To share information on the proposals, models of care, community integration collaboration networks, and politics that center on building geographic reforms across all service providers.

Needs of Older Gay and Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender Persons
Chair: Carl Burton, MD  
Mission: To increase awareness for considering the needs of older gay and lesbian, bisexual, and transgender persons; To foster a more formal analysis and observation of these needs.

Older Adults Facing Chronic Kidney Disease and/or Kidney Failure
Co-Chairs: Christine Liu, MD & Devika Nair, MD, MCS1, Totini Chatterjee, MD
Mission: To discuss the ways interdisciplinary collaboration can help older adults and their family members feel supported in the dialysis vs conservative management decision making process; to collaborate on how to create co-management geriatrics and renal subspecialty clinics; and to foster research on outcomes that affect the quality of life of older adults with kidney disease, such as falls, re-hospitalization rates, and end of life care.

Oral Health and Swallowing
Co-Chairs: Nicole Pulia, PhD, CCC-SLP & Raele Donetha Loy, MD
Mission: To provide a forum where issues that impact the oral health of older adults are presented, and where challenges requiring a team approach to coordinate needed treatments can be discussed.

Osteoporosis and Metabolic Bone Diseases
Co-Chairs: Sarah D. Berry, MD & Cathleen Colon-Emeric, MD 
Mission: To discuss future strategies to promote improved education and care for bone loss in older adults.

Palliative Care
Co-Chairs: Mona Gupta, MD & Lauren Mazzurco, MD
Mission: To promote awareness of palliative care issues in the geriatrics community; To identify and build on synergies that exist between geriatrics and palliative care.

Patient Priorities-Aligned Care for Older Adults with Multiple Chronic Conditions
Co-Chairs: Claire Davenport, MD & Ardeshir Hashimi, MD
Mission: Older adults with multiple chronic conditions (MCC) receive care that is fragmented, burdensome, and most importantly is not focused on what matters most to them. There is little evidence to guide disease-specific care for people with MCC, who are generally excluded from randomized controlled trials, leading to uncertainty in decision-making for clinicians. Guideline-driven care is not always applicable to older adults with multiple chronic conditions, as it may not accrue the expected benefits and may lead to treatment burden. Most importantly, this care may not be focused on what matters most to persons with MCCs, the health outcomes they prioritize when faced with tradeoffs and the treatments they are willing and able to adhere to. This Special Interest Group aims to identify alternatives to disease guideline-based care, specifically ways to implement patient priorities aligned decision making. Patient priorities aligned decision making calls upon patients and caregivers to articulate their health priorities; communicate those priorities to all team members; patients, caregivers and clinicians then together choose the healthcare best aligned with these health priorities.

Point-of-Care Ultrasound
Chair: Emily Coskun, MD 
Mission: Point-of-Care Ultrasound (POCUS) is a rapidly growing and evolving field that allows the use of ultrasound for rapid, bedside diagnosis and treatment of common concerns including respiratory failure, renal failure, and shock. POCUS is used commonly in the intensive care unit and on medical-surgical floors by hospital medicine providers. It is also uniquely suited to the care of geriatrics patients, but not as commonly used by geriatric providers. POCUS can allow for diagnosis and treatment with handheld devices in the home, nursing home, hospital, or clinic. This can align with older patients' priorities of avoiding invasive testing and providing additional information without radiation. This SIG will explore the applications of POCUS on the geriatric population.  

Post Acute and Long-Term Care
Chair: Nicole Orr, MD, FACC
Mission: To serve as a resource and voice to the AGS, the public, healthcare practitioners, policy makers, and various educational centers regarding issues on the availability, delivery, quality and regulation of long-term care (LTC) in the U.S.

Polypharmacy
Chair: Cara McDermott, PhD, PharmD, MSc 
Mission: Dedicated to issues related to medication use in older adults. Our goal is to facilitate education and discussion on this topic, both within the group and for a wider audience.

Program of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE)
Chairs: Venise Lewis, Sabrina Villalba
Mission: The Program for All-Inclusive Care of the Elderly (PACE) is a comprehensive, fully integrated model that provides community-based care for nursing home eligible frail elders. We provide information to people who are interested in working with or establishing a PACE organization. 

Society for General Internal Medicine Geriatrics (SGIM)
Co-Chairs: Judith Vick, MD, MPH & Eva Szymanski, MD
Mission: Serve as a source of collaborative activity between AGS and the Society for General Internal Medicine (SGIM). We focus on ways to collaborate on developing workshops for the AGS & SGIM annual meetings, as well as fostering ongoing collaborative efforts and better communication between the two groups.

Tideswell Leaders in Aging Program 
Co-Chairs: Suvi Neukam, DO, Chitra Hamilton, MD, Heather Lander, MD & Mariah Robertson, MD
The mission of the SIG is to support Tideswell scholars and leaders in geriatrics through mentorship, networking, continued leadership training, and scholarship with the ultimate goal of a commitment to enhancing the care of older adults through clinical work, research and education.

Veterans Health Administration
Chair: Cynthia Johnson
Mission: To offer an opportunity to discuss in an open forum announcements and key issues related to geriatrics, extended care clinical programs, and research and education initiatives. All VHA staff attending the AGS Annual Scientific Meeting, and all other interested meeting attendees, are invited to participate.

You do not need to be an AGS member to join an AGS SIG, but SIG online communities are exclusive to AGS members. There are multiple ways to join a SIG: Contact the SIG chair with a request to join. Names and contact details for each chair are listed above. 

AGS members can join a SIG by clicking on a SIG name below and selecting "join a community".

Attend a SIG meeting held in conjunction with the AGS Annual Meeting.

If after reviewing the AGS current SIG list you believe that there is a topic or issue that is not currently being addressed, the application steps for establishing a new SIG are included in the SIG handbook. We encourage members to reach out to chairs or existing SIGs that are focused on a similar topic or issue to discuss whether that SIG is addressing your topic or would consider incorporating it into SIG activities. One of the criteria used for reviewing and approving applications to establish a SIG is that the proposed SIG does not have a significant overlap with the work of an existing SIG.