D'Arcy Little, MD, CCFP
Director of Medical Education,
York Community Services, Toronto, ON.

Introduction
The nurses inform you that the elderly woman in Bed 140-B is agitated, and is complaining that a ghost-like man has been frightening her in her room at night. She is recovering from hip surgery that took place the day before yesterday. When you examine her in the morning, she is drowsy. Later that afternoon she is awake but has difficulty attending to your questions. You begin a work-up for postoperative delirium.

At one time or another, all physicians have faced the challenge of treating a delirious elderly patient in hospital. Delirium is a common, serious, yet potentially preventable cause of morbidity and mortality that primarily affects the elderly and is very common in the elderly post-surgical patient.^1-3 The condition is characterized by a disturbance of consciousness and a change in cognition that develops over a short period of time and tends to have a fluctuating course over the day. It is caused by the direct physiological consequences of a general medical condition (See Table 1).^2,4 The following article will review the epidemiology and etiology of delirium with a view to presenting an approach to the prevention of postoperative delirium in the elderly surgical patient.

Recognizing the Clinical Features of Delirium can Save the Lives of the Hospitalized Elderly

Nariman Malik, BSc

Confusion in the elderly is a common problem. Its onset may be acute or chronic and progressive in nature. Confusion may be a symptom of delirium or dementia but it may also be associated with psychoses and affective disorders, in particular major depression.¹ This article focuses on delirium, one of the most common and frequently unrecognized causes of confusion in the elderly.

Delirium is a syndrome of disturbed consciousness, attention and cognition or perception, which develops acutely, fluctuates during the course of the day, and is a direct physiologic consequence of a general medical condition.^2-4 Delirious patients may also have psychomotor and emotional disturbances. In most cases, delirium is reversible upon treatment of the underlying medical condition.¹ Currently, a great deal of attention is being focused on this condition because of the huge impact it has on patients and their families, as well as on patient care costs. Delirium is a phenomenon that is common in hospitalized patients, and is associated with high morbidity and mortality rates, and significantly extended lengths of hospital stay.⁵

The incidence of delirium increases progressively after the fourth decade of life.