SAGA: A Society for ‘Aging’ Anesthesiologists

he Society for the Advancement of Geriatric Anesthesia (SAGA) continues to grow while maintaining its devotion to promoting age-appropriate care to elders through education, research and training. While advanced age was historically considered to be a contraindication to surgery, advances in anesthesia now allow elders, many of whom have significant coexisting disease processes, to undergo increasingly complex surgical procedures with relatively low mortality. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, approximately 15 million patients over the age of 65 undergo surgical procedures each year in the United States. These numbers are expected to increase over the next few decades as baby boomers enter their “golden years.” As anesthesiologists we aim to prepare ourselves and our specialty for this demographic shift by increasing awareness and understanding of the unique traits of elders.

SAGA exists to improve the care of the older person having surgery through education and research. Our educational initiatives have included several important efforts. The members of SAGA have worked together with the ASA Committee on Geriatric Anesthesia and the American Geriatrics Society to develop a Geriatric Anesthesia Curriculum. This comprehensive curriculum includes both major topics and current references. It is to be posted on the ASA Web site and will be freely available to both residents and practitioners caring for vulnerable elders.

Additional efforts involve educational programs provided to other anesthesiology societies. In particular there will be several panels devoted to geriatric issues at the ASA Annual Meeting. SAGA also is collaborating with our European colleagues in the Age Anaesthesia Association www.aaa-online.org.uk (the equivalent of SAGA in the United Kingdom) to promote education in elderly perioperative care.

The research initiatives of SAGA have included several projects. Our Annual Meeting will include a poster discussion of current geriatric research from a broad range of investigators. The members of SAGA have worked together with the ASA Committee on Geriatric Anesthesia to encourage more sessions in topics pertinent to geriatric anesthesiology. In addition SAGA has been actively involved with the Foundation for Anesthesia Education and Research Geriatric Research Council in formulating a proposal for a geriatric anesthesiology fellowship that will train anesthesiologists committed to pursuing careers as teachers and physician investigators in the field of geriatric anesthesiology. Some of these efforts are coming to fruition. For instance, as “aging” anesthesiologists, we were particularly impressed with the March issue of Anesthesiology wherein a number of original articles and reviews addressed questions pertaining to cognitive and functional performance of elders in the postoperative period.

Our 8th Annual Meeting will be held in San Francisco on Sunday, October 14, 2007, from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. All ASA members interested in the care of elders are invited to attend. For additional information concerning membership or Society activities, please visit the SAGA Web site at www.sagahq.org.

Deborah J. Culley, M.D., is Assistant Professor of Anesthesiology, Department of Anesthesiology, Perioperative and Pain Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts.

Frederick E. Sieber, M.D., is Associate Professor, Director of Anesthesiology, Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center, Department of Anesthesiology and Critical Care Medicine, Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, Baltimore, Maryland.