If age alone were presumed to be a disease, that could lead to inadequate care from physicians, he says. Rather than pinpoint exactly what’s troubling a patient, a problem could simply be dismissed as a consequence of advanced years.
“The crux of the matter is that if you legitimize old age as a diagnosis, you run the risk of a lot of people using it inappropriately,” Rabheru says. A number of experts agreed. “There was a huge momentum that built up globally to say, ‘This is wrong,’” he says.
This line of reasoning is common, but I don’t like it. If “aging” meets the criteria for being a disease (I am not saying it does - I am not sure), then in my opinion it would be correct to call it that. Doctors are supposed to be well-trained in critical thinking, so I hope that defining old age as a disease will not cause many of them to become more dismissive about specific problems just because they are comorbid with old age.
I can see the merit in both of these arguments, but I lean towards slightly disagreeing with you on that. Doctors are people too and wording like that has caused problems in the past. (Off the top of my head I think about mental health issues simply being labeled as insanity) I also would hope that a new definition of aging would not cause doctors to dismiss problems, but the fact that I could easily see that happening is more than enough reason to stay away from it, at least for me.
