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.
I wonder if only looking at Medicare patients in their study skewed the results. Many doctors are refusing to treat Medicare patients and some of those that are treating them have developed a less-then-professional attitude due to the hassles of dealing with ever-increasing government regulations and ever-decreasing reimbursement rates. If I have a doctor that doesn’t seem to care any more, I’m moving on to better care – younger or older it does not matter as much as whether they care or not. Same thing holds true to any service based profession/professional.
How about a study of how safe Affirmative Action doctors are?
I avoid affirmative action doc’s…..And I avoid Indian docs or any educated in a 3rd world.
Next time you fly, that pilot sitting in the cockpit is required by law to retire at 65. That limit was raised from 60 a couple of years ago. The man/woman sitting in the left seat has 100+ people dependent on their skill…. As part of their training they have to take certain ‘check’ rides, and attend a recurrent training annually…Does that doc who is 60 required to do that? Doctors seem to be getting a free ride…
It is a known fact that people age differently. At age 70, your car insurance GO’s UP…Actuarially, seniors have more accidents then the general population….There are some 70 plus people who are better than someone in their 40’s…and driving is just one area……Doctors/medical people are no different.
FAKE NEWS- AGE DISCRIMINATION! Really? Let me have an old doctor instead of a wet behind the ears newbie help-desk herder. The old guys remember what personal relationships with patients were like. They tend to still want to operate on a personal level. The problem is finding an older one. They all are quitting or being replaced by nurse practitioners. Doctors are being told by a bunch of pencil pusher how to do their job and queue filling is all that matters to them. We are not cattle.
Just Remember that Doctors are Only Practicing Medicine They Haven’t Master it yet.
All this means is you have to keep up with your profession no matter what it is. Things are always changing and if you are lazy you will be behind and inefficient. It applies across the board. Also being over 50 I choose a doctor with small hands.
It is 100% likely that, no matter how old your doctor is, you ALL will DIE.
Just think of all the over 60-year olds in Congress. Now there’s a cause for pause.
From the Boston Globe, dated Oct 31st, “…A D.C. pharmacist says his pharmacy has filled prescriptions for “pretty serious health problems” for members of Congress, including drugs for Alzheimer’s disease…”
Just for the halibut, I think I’ll run this by my doctor who is about 60. LOL
I started reading this study and have noted several flaws already. The most glaring is how the researchers defined “high volume” among the physicians studied. They claimed high volume as greater than 200 admissions a year. Keep in mind that the study found no difference in mortality rates of patients of older vs. younger “high volume” hospitalists.
Let me explain to the uninitiated: 200 admissions is not a “high volume” for a hospitalist. If you were to ask me to define “high volume” I would probably tell you “greater than 900 admissions annually”.I have my own private outpatient practice and average 300+ admissions a year in my inpatient practice which is only about 10-15% of my practice. With 200 admissions and lets just say a 5 day average hospital stay per patient (which would be high) that’s 1,000 patient visits per year or only 20 patient visits per week. Thats like not even working. I have 6,000-7,000 patient visits a year. So the doctors in which the researchers found this elevated mortality rate really are working part-time, moonlighting or semi-retired.
this is probably one of those studies where publishing the results does more harm than good
They failed to take into account that most patients are older, request older doctors, and older people die more than younger ones, thus skewing the results. Once again correlation does not imply causation.
This was a study of hospitalists…they just admit everyone who comes to the hospital, young and old. They have no established patients.
Y’know, there’s another side to this. Even if the study did control for age of patients, as about half the comments here ask or suggest. Sometimes, with older patients, the DNR is the right answer. Maybe more of those go to the older doctors, or the older doctors understand them better.
I chose a young surgeon for my prostatectomy, because he was trained at Mayo Clinic. Big mistake. It all went wrong in every possible way, and I live with the consequences. Many of my friends had excellent results with an older, experienced surgeon, who I now see, too late.