RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Is it appropriate to link ‘old age’ to certain causes of death on the medical certificate of cause of death?
JF Future Healthcare Journal
JO Future Healthc J
FD Royal College of Physicians
SP e686
OP e688
DO 10.7861/fhj.2021-0050
VO 8
IS 3
A1 Vedamurthy Adhiyaman
A1 Indrajit Chattopadhyay
YR 2021
UL http://www.rcpjournals.org/content/8/3/e686.abstract
AB In the current list of acceptable causes of death in the medical certificate of cause of death, some causes are either linked to old age or could be used for all people over the age of 80 years. Notable ones include ‘frailty of old age’, ‘debility of old age’ and ‘senility’. It is best to avoid these terms as they provide an erroneous impression that these conditions occurred because a person was old; we recommend that the list of acceptable causes of death is revised by engaging all stakeholders.