"The continuous evolution of community geriatrics and care for older people; the open end of continuous developments..."
 

In his farewell speech, Jos Schols first looks back on developments in elderly care since World War II. He concludes that desirable changes occur very slowly and that this largely has to do with how we generally view ‘old age ’ and try to solve its associated problems. He then discusses the phenomenon of 'medicalisation of old age' and the limitations of an overly dominant medical perspective on old age. In fact, a managed care system in which old age is highly medicalised leads to older people becoming extra dependent. Schols makes clear that we must learn to look at older people differently and that we must include them as partners in the transformation of elderly care. He then presents essential elements of a sustainable future of elderly care. Thereafter he discusses the status quo of the specialty of elderly care medicine and also the importance of good education in elderly care medicine and elderly care in basic medical training and beyond.                                                                                 

Appropriate elderly care and elderly care medicine must comply with the current state of science and practice. In the last part of his farewell speech, Schols, therefore, emphasizes the importance for elderly care and elderly care medicine of relevant observational and evaluation research on the one hand and, above all, of good and carefully conducted effect research on the other. He concludes that the Academic Living Labs for Elderly Care, such as the Living Lab in Ageing and Long-term Care- Limburg, offer a good infrastructure for this.

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