CAMBRIDGE, Mass. — If you could choose your doctor, would you prefer youth or experience? You might pick the fresh-faced physician if you consider that patients in hospital settings are more likely to die when treated by doctors who are at least 60 years old, according to a recent study.
Researchers at Harvard wanted to know how well physicians perform as they age. They looked at the records of 730,000 Medicare patients treated between 2011 and 2014 by more than 18,800 hospital-based internists (hospitalists).
Patient deaths rose gradually as physicians aged, but the biggest gap —1.3 percentage points —showed up between hospitalists 40 and younger and those 60 and older. This means one additional death for every 77 patients admitted by a doctor who is 60 or older versus a doctor who is 40 or younger.
Study senior investigator Anupam Jena, an associate professor of Health Care Policy at the university and a physician at Massachusetts General Hospital, says this outcome raises some serious concerns.
“It is comparable to the difference in death rates observed between patients at high risk for heart disease who are treated with proper heart medications and those who receive none,” she explains in a Harvard Medical School release.
There is a bright spot, however, in all this aging gloom and doom. When physicians carry heavy caseloads, physician age is not a factor in patient mortality. Researchers believe that caring for large numbers of patients keeps a doctor’s skill set strong.
Older doctors may have knowledge that can only be gained by experience, but they cannot just rest on their laurels. They have to keep up with the rapid changes that come with new research and technology.
“The results of our study suggest the critical importance of continuing medical education throughout a doctor’s entire career, regardless of age and experience,” Jena says.
Researchers say this study is too limited to draw any final conclusions about how older physicians perform on the job. They would like to look into what else might be influencing the higher mortality rates in patients cared for by older doctors.
Perhaps, in answer to the first question posed, your best bet is to choose the busiest doctor.
The study’s findings were published in The BMJ.
This study reminds me of the study of mortality at various hospitals that neglected to take into account hospitals and affiliated doctors & surgeons that take on the most difficult and complicated cases. Indeed the very best hospitals were those that accepted risky & difficult cases even though that policy hurt their mortality statistics. In this study, as far as I can tell, there was no differentiation by age of patient or seriousness of the patient’s condition. Without those and other variables, the study is next to worthless.
As a doctor, as I get older, so do my patients, and the older we get, the sicker we get. I have had to save quite a few of my patients from the “care” of younger doctors- and nurse practitioners.
Remember the old German folk saying
” A New Doctor means a full graveyard”
The question is, is it due to age related loss of mental capacity to think? Or, because the old timers are still practicing medicine in a manner that is naive to the latest scientific evidence?
Hummm good questions. There should be a study.
Great lets fire the doctors with the most experience right Harvard?. Maybe those more experienced Doctors get referred the toughest cases.Did you ever think of that Harvard? What you won’t do- and unbiased study looking at morbidity and mortality of patient seeing NPs as their primary caregivers or instead of seeing the MD in specialty practices. One has to seriously question the role of Harvard in society. While MIT graduates (my alma mater ) account for the equivalent of the 11th largest GDP in the world ,Harvard brings us SJW and age biased studies.
I don’t believe this… every single industry and science proves that experience is the highest deciding factor in any type up outcome…
Frankly, with the fast development off AI, remote sensor using nano technology, and advanced robotic surgery techniques, I would prefer a computer diagnosis over a human doctor. AI would have perfect knowledge off all medical knowledge at all times. Provided accurate lab data were maintained over an individual’s lifetime, something that is not done today, computers cold easily determiner a medical profile based on the individual and use that data stream to provide early detection of a medical condition needing observation and/or treatment.
The process I described above is what doctors attempt to do, and they do it fairly well, but given the current state of AI, nano-technology, and the rapid advance in medical knowledge, there is no way any human doctor can or will be competitive in the future.
Charles, why do you think doctors aren’t using advanced computer technology?
I know they are using advanced computer techniques procedurally, I actually have had a prostatectomy using the Davinci robotic system and cryoablation to fix an AV problem. What I am talking about is using AI and nanobots as the primary diagnostic tool managing health in the future.
http://medicalfuturist.com/artificial-intelligence-will-redesign-healthcare/
Some use advanced technology, but sometimes it’s like a chimp with a chainsaw, the whole structure of the modern “practice” is a millennium out of date. I’m also looking forward to some more AI in medicine.
Why? Are you trying to achieve singularity or something?
This isn’t a study. This is a communist propaganda piece designed to condition sheeple into accepting the sewer of commie care we peons will eventually be completely imprisoned within.
my doctor is still going strong at 92. went to a large famous NYC Hospital for a complete check up and said nothing was wrong. week later checked in with old Doc for a second go, sent me directly to St Francis Heart Hospital, LI, NY. widow maker artery 95% blocked…..he saved my life. they said I would have died within 3 months.(lot of collateral arteries masked the blockage) now ride my mountain bike 10 miles a day with no problem. (that and a strict Dr Esselstyn plant based diet) would not take no for an answer, gave old Doc a case of red wine from St Francis Winery, CA lol.
Your diet sounds sorely lacking.
Over 99% of patients who die in the hospital die at the hands of a doctor with two legs. Less than 1% die in the hands of a doctor with one leg.
I will take the older doctor. You can have the shirt tail PA’s.
Years ago, I was rushed into the emergency room with acute appendicitis. Young unknown intern doctor, emergency operation. Result: all okay, with only a scar about an inch and a half when established surgeons of the time were performing the same operation and leaving a scar the size of the stomach … and bigger!!! When the intern went out on his own, he soon became the ‘best’. Point being that those closest to recently leaving school knew the most up to date methods. I assume that still holds.
An older doctor taught this guy the technique.
Seems to me an older doctor would have patients much older than a younger doctor. Doctor loyalty.
They are trying to institutionalize ageism. Hitler had university studies showing that Germans were smarter than blacks or Jews. They want to make it legal to discriminate against people strictly on age alone. Shun this kind of hate.
did study asccount for age of patients treated? maybe older doctors are preferred by people more ;ikely to die, i.e older patients.