[Patient care in nursing homes by the family physician]. / Hausärztliche Betreuung des Heimpatienten. Vermeiden Sie Uberdiagnostik und Polypragmasie.

When treating the acute and chronic diseases of nursing home residents, the family physician must consider the patient's decreased ability to make decisions and shortened life expectancy in each case. Nurses tend the elderly people, help them wherever it is necessary, have time to listen to the hardships and worries of their charges and are an irreplaceable help to the family physician for observing patients and assessing the measures taken based on these observations.

[Guideline skating for the family doctor]. / Werden wir Hausärzte zu Medizinrobotern degradiert?

The sheer mass of guidelines sometimes gives the physician more of a headache rather than the support in his diagnostic and therapeutic endeavors--which is the actual service they are supposed to provide. Indeed, different guidelines exist for one and the same disease--it all boils down to the specialty concerned. Furthermore, proof of the quality of the individual medical guidelines is often lacking. Some doctors also worry that their individual work with the patient is degenerating ever more into an automated standardized process.

[Dying with dignity: The perspective of the family doctor]. / Vorbereitung auf den Abschied.

The medical possibilities of keeping a patient alive with the aid of drugs and technical aids are constantly expanding. A more difficult decision that the care-providing physician is called upon to make is: when is the point reached when further treatment no longer makes sense? From here on, the objective is to enable the patient to die with dignity,which entails allowing him/her and relatives the opportunity to take their leave of one another.

[Heat-related problems in the elderly]. / 30 Grad im Schatten? Senioren sind schon ab 28 Grad gefährdet!

In particular in the elderly patient, exposure to heat can lead to disturbances of the circulatory system and of the water and electrolyte balance. Provided that certain prophylactic measures are taken, serious problems are unlikely to occur. Food and drink should be matched to the ambient temperature, and permanent medication should be checked. In the case of confused persons, nursing personnel should substitute for any failure to make the necessary acclimatization changes (appropriate clothing). In the case of incontinent patients, it must be remembered that the diapered area is not available for radiating off heat.