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Silver paper: The future of health promotion and preventive actions, basic research, and clinical aspects of age-related disease

A report of the European Summit on Age-Related Disease

  • Consensus Document
  • Published:
Aging Clinical and Experimental Research Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

Background. In September 2008, under the French Presidency of the European Union and with the support of the Polish Minister of Health, a European Summit on Age-Related Disease was organised in Wroclaw (Poland). At this meeting, European politicians, gerontologists and geriatricians gathered to discuss a common approach to future challenges related to age-related disease. Politicians and decision-makers from the European Union and Ministers of Health and their deputies from many European countries raised the problems and difficulties to be tackled in a growing population with a high burden of disease, and asked scientists to write a consensus document with recommendations for future actions and decisions. Scientists and clinicians worked in parallel in three different groups, on health promotion and preventive actions, basic research in age-related disease, and clinical aspects of disease in older people. Beforehand, the format of the paper with recommendations was discussed, and it was finally agreed that, for a better understanding by decision-makers, it would be divided in two different columns: one with facts that were considered settled and agreed by most experts (under the heading We know), and a second with recommendations related to each fact (We recommend). No limit on the number of topics to be discussed was settled. After careful and detailed discussion in each group, which in most cases included the exact wording of each statement, chairpersons presented the results in a plenary session, and new input from all participants was received, until each of the statements and recommendations were accepted by a large majority. Areas with no consensus were excluded from the document. Immediately after the Summit, the chairpersons sent the document both to the main authors and to a list of experts (see footnote) who had made presentations at the summit and agreed to review and critically comment on the final document, which is presented below. As regards the scientific aspects of the planning of the Summit, several organisations, under the leadership of the EUGMS, were asked both to review the program and to suggest names of speakers and participants. After the Summit, the Boards of these organizations (European Union Geriatric Medicine Society (EUGMS), International Association of Gerontology and Geriatrics-European Region (IAGG-ER), European Association of Geriatric Psychiatry (EAGP), International Society of Gerontechnology (ISG) and International Society for the Study of the Aging Male (IS-SAM) agreed to consider the document as an official paper, and help with its dissemination. The name Silver Paper was used, recalling the grey or silvery hair of our older citizens, as an easy reference. It has been sent officially to several bodies of the European Union and to Health Ministers of most European countries; and will be published in other languages in local purnals. Its declared intention is to foster changes in policies which may, in the future, reduce the burden of disease in old age.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Hospital Universitario Ramón y Cajal, Madrid, Spain

    Alfonso J. Cruz-Jentoft

  2. Université Joseph Fourier, Grenoble, France

    Alain Franco

  3. Institut de Biologie et de Chimie des Protéines, Lyon, France

    Pascal Sommer

  4. AZ Damiaan Hospital, Oostende, Belgium

    Jean Pierre Baeyens

  5. Military Hospital, Wroclaw, Poland

    Ewa Jankowska & Piotr Ponikowski

  6. Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano, Italy

    Adriana Maggi

  7. DG Health and Consumers, Public Health, European Commission, Italy

    Andrzej Ryś

  8. Uniwersytet Jagiellonski, Krakow, Poland

    Kataryna Szczerbinska

  9. Hôpitaux Universitaires de Genève, Genève, Switzerland

    Jean-Pierre Michel

  10. Akademia Medyczna we Wrocławiu, Wroclaw, Poland

    Andrzej Milewicz

Authors
  1. Alfonso J. Cruz-Jentoft
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  2. Alain Franco
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  3. Pascal Sommer
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  4. Jean Pierre Baeyens
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  5. Ewa Jankowska
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  6. Adriana Maggi
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  7. Piotr Ponikowski
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  8. Andrzej Ryś
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  9. Kataryna Szczerbinska
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  10. Jean-Pierre Michel
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  11. Andrzej Milewicz
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Alfonso J. Cruz-Jentoft.

Additional information

This is a consensus report of the outcome of the European Summit on Age-Related Disease (Wroclaw, 11–13 September 2008), held under the French Presidency of the European Union. It is based on reports and contributions from K. Andersen-Ranberg, F. Benvenuti, B. Bien, P. Błedowski, J. Buján, C. Büla, A. Bürkle, A. Cherubini, G. Crepaldi, A.J. Cruz-Jentoft, F. de Man, H. Dohner, D. Dunn-Walters, H. Finne-Soveri, A. Franco, T. Grodzicki, P. Jansen-Dürr, T. Kostka, J. Kuznicki, J. Lisowski, B. Lunenfeld, A. Maggi, S. Maggi, J.P. Michel, A. Milewicz, P. Millard, J. Perek-Bialas, E. Petridou, V. Pirags, J. Rymaszewska, D. Skelton, J. Sławek, J. Spławinski, P. Sommer, M. Suominen, K. Szczerbinska, N. Tavemarakis, C. Todd, E. Topinkova, U. Tworowska-Bardzinska, K. Wieczoroswka-Tobis, W. Wuttke and W. Zatonski.

This position paper is supported by the following organisations: European Union Geriatric Medicine Society (EUGMS), International Association of Geriatrics and Gerontology s- European Region (IAGG-ER), European Association of Geriatric Psychiatry (EAGP), International Society for Gerontechnology, and International Society for the Study of the Aging Male (ISSAM). Updates and other information on this paper will be made available at www.eugms.org

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Cruz-Jentoft, A.J., Franco, A., Sommer, P. et al. Silver paper: The future of health promotion and preventive actions, basic research, and clinical aspects of age-related disease. Aging Clin Exp Res 21, 376–385 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03327452

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF03327452

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