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Originally Posted by Mudder
I happen to agree with you, VillagePL. I noticed in one of the interviews the physician said he enjoys getting to know the whole family and watching them grow, etc.... my thought was , well that will not be the case in The Villages at all.
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I was thinking the same thing. Many of these doctors have experience with whole families and are not from retirement communities. They may have had some older patients but how good were they at taking care of them?
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There are so many differences in older people as oppossed to younger people, I hope they will be aware of those differences. One thing that comes to mind is medication dosage, what's good for a 35 year old may not be correct for a 65 year old.
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That's right. There's a long long list of medications that should never be given to older patients. Gerontologists are aware of this but not all family doctors are. I read about a survey that was done to prove it but I don't remember where I read it. The dosage is another thing that's important, even for vitamins.
I first got tested for vitamin D3 because I read that most older people are deficient. Was the doctor aware of most older people being deficient? I don't think so because I was going to him for a couple of years and he never included it on my blood test. So I had to ask for it and sure enough I was very very low. 30 would be normal and I was at 8. So he suggested I take a large dosage of 50,000 IU weekly, presumably to catch up. But, thankfully, he forgot to give me a prescription for it. It was way more than I would have been able to tolerate. I bought some over the counter and found from experience that I can only tolerate about 600 IU per day. And that's the standard amount that's recommended in most vitamin books.
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If I decide to go to one of the health centers I will be asking about the experience level with older people. I do think these centers are a step in the right direction, we'll have to wait and see.
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Yes, good for you for your willingness to ask, but I doubt they will ever admit that they don't have enough experience. And if we wait to see, all the doctors will be hired and it will be too late.