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Committee
James Warner (UK)
Aleksandra Milicevic - Kalasic (Serbia)
Jerzy Lezsak (Poland)
Cecile Hanon (France)

Ex-officio
Cornelius Katona (former co-chair) (UK)
Edmond Chiu (immediate past chair) (Australia)

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE SECTION

Goals:

To promote the discipline of Old Age Psychiatry within the framework of WPA Means:

1. To ensure that WPA executive committee and council are well informed of old age psychiatry issues.
2. To organise lectures, symposia and workshop at WPA regional meetings and world congresses
3. To collaborate with other international organisations with similar interests, and to participate in major international meetings relevant to the discipline
4. To develop and disseminate educational material for practitioners in the field
5. To provide technical support to relevant national organisation and WPA member societies.

ACTIVITIES

Symposia to be proposed during following meetings:

• Paris, June 2000, WPA Regional Meeting
• Nice, June 2001, IPA Congress
• Melbourne, October 2001, WPA Regional Meeting
• London, May 2001, WPA Regional Meeting
• Yokohama, August 2002, WPA Congress
• Florence, November 2004, WPA Sponsored International Congress
• Athens, March 2005, WPA Regional Congress
• Cairo, 2005, WPA Congress
• Nice, March 2006, AEP Congress
• Rio de Janeiro, April 2006, International Symposium of Old Age Psychiatry
• Lisbon, May 2006, IPA Regional Meeting
• Istanbul, June 2006, WPA Regional Meeting
• Madrid, March 2007, AEP Congress
• Prague, October 2008, WPA Congress
• Florence, April 2009, WPA International Congress
• Montreal, September 2009, IPA Congress

PUBLICATIONS

• Lausanne Technical Consensus Statements on Psychiatry of the Elderly
  World Health Organization, Geneva – 1999.
  This PDF document is a compilation of three previous WHO documents, respectively on:
  
  • WPA/WHO: Psychiatry of the elderly: A consensus statement. (Doc: WHO/MNH/MND/96.7), Geneva: WHO, 1996; 11 pages.
  • WPA/WHO: Organisation of care in Psychiatry of the Elderly: A technical consensus statement. (DOC: WHO/MSA/MNH/MND/97.3), Geneva: WHO, 1997; 15 pages.
  • WPA/WHO: Education in Psychiatry of the Elderly: A technical consensus statement. (DOC: WHO/MSA/MNH/MND/98.4), Geneva: WHO, 1998; 9 pages.
  Download complete pdf document
• Other Consensus statements
  
  • WPA/WHO: Reducing Stigma and Discrimination Against Older People With Mental Disorders (DOC: WHO/MSD/MBD/02.3) Geneva: WHO, 2002; 26 pages.
• Articles where the section was involved: 
  • GUSTAFSON L, BURNS A, KATONA C, BERTOLOTE JM, CAMUS V, COPELAND JRM, DUFEY AF, GRAHAM N, IHL R, KANOWSKI S, KÜHNE N, DE MENDONCA LIMA CA, MATEOS ALVAREZ R, RUTZ W, TATARU NL, TUDOSE C.
    Skill-based objectives for specialist training in old age psychiatry. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry 2003, 18: 686-693
  • CAMUS V, KATONA C, DE MENDONCA LIMA CA, HAKAM AMA, GRAHAM N, BALDWIN R, CHIU E, on behalf of the WPA section on old age psychiatry.
    Teaching and training in old age psychiatry: a general survey of the World Psychiatric Association member societies. International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry 2003, 18: 694-699.

• Book
  
  • BALDWIN RC, CHIU E, KATONA C, GRAHAM N. Guidelines on Depression in Older People.
    Practising the Evidence. Martin Dunitz, London, 2002.
    Prepared under the auspices of the WPA Sections of Old Age Psychiatry and Affective Disorder.
• "World Psychiatric Association section of Old Age Psychiatry consensus statement on ethics and capacity in older people with mental disorders" - INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF GERIATRIC PSYCHIATRY 2009

Recent Realizations

The WPA Section of Old Age Psychiatry realized a new Consensus Meeting on Ethics and Capacity in Older People with Mental Disorders with the participation if International Council of Nurses, Alzheimer Europe and Alzheimer Disease International. Participants who are recognised for their expertise in this area came from 11 countries and include psychiatrists, neurologist, nurse and family caregiving representatives. The Consensus Group met in Prague, Czech Republic, on September 2008 to develop a Position Statement of the Section on this relevant subject.

The aim of the Position Statement is to provide a practical tool to assist all those involved on ethical issues. It is addressed to health and social care practitioners, trainees, professional organisations, older people, their families and carers, NGOs and other advocacy groups, healthcare commissioners and policy makers as well as to the general public. The provision of high-quality care to older people with mental illness raises complex ethical problems; for example, guiding decision making around transfer from independent to institutional care and in the allocation of scarce health resources. Mental health professionals have a particular responsibility to ensure that older people with mental health problems are involved to the maximum degree in decisions about their treatment and care, to safeguard their patients’ rights and to combat ageism and elder abuse. Its objectives are to promote debate at all levels on these ethical issues, to describe the main contexts where the provision of high-quality care to older people with mental illness raises complex ethical problems, to inform practice and training and to encourage effective advocacy.

The document was approved by the International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry and will be published soon.

PLANS

WPA-SOAP & WFSBP

• to collaborate to the production of Guidelines in the Treatment of Resistant Depression in Old Age.

WPA-SOAP & IPA

• to co-organize with the IPA Task Force on Mental Health Services in Residential Facilities a consensus meeting on Residential Care for Old People with Mental Disorders.
• to participate to the project Assessing Mental Health Resources for Old People with Mental Disorders around the World.
• to participate to the IPA Task Force on Mental Health Economics initiative to propose an alternative to QALY in dementia.