Summary
The admonition to attend to the “whole” person is part of the preamble of many discussions on geriatrics. This attention, it is pointed out, requires an understanding of the interaction of biological with psychosocial factors as they affect health, illness, and overall functioning in the older patient. The discussion that follows examines such interactions from a particular vantage point by looking at examples within various systems of the body, including the cardiovascular, pulmonary, gastrointestinal, endocrine, immune, and central nervous systems. Within this framework several paradigms will be considered: psychiatric factors that precipitate physical health problems; physical health problems with psychiatric consequences; and the effect of concurrent mental and physical health problems on one another. In the process, clinical relationships and research questions will be identified.
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Cohen, G. (1985). Toward an Interface of Mental and Physical Health Phenomena in Geriatrics: Clinical Findings and Questions. In: Gaitz, C.M., Samorajski, T. (eds) Aging 2000: Our Health Care Destiny. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-5058-6_24
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4612-5058-6_24
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