We are pleased to announce the new Specialty Chief Editor of the Geriatric Medicine section of Frontiers in Medicine – Dr. Tzvi Dwolatzky, who is also the President of the Israel Geriatric Society. Dr. Dwolatzky is Director of Geriatric Services at Rambam Medical Center, Haifa, and Associate Professor of Geriatrics at the Rappaport Faculty of Medicine, Technion – Israel Institute of Health Sciences. He has made important scientific contributions to various aspects of aging and common geriatric conditions such as Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias, frailty and longevity.

In recent years, there has been increasing awareness of the issues that arise as a result of the growing and aging world population and its implications for healthcare, workforce, economy, social insurance and changing family structures. Increasing life expectancy poses new challenges to medicine and healthcare, emphasizing the need to find better approaches to cope with chronic noncommunicable diseases, currently being the major cause of death for the elderly. Given recent reported trends of unprecedented, pervasive and enduring aging of the world population, it is of utmost importance to improve and advance geriatric medicine.

Dr. Dwolatzky emphasizes: “Geriatrics must become a vibrant field of medicine in order to meet the demographic challenges of global aging. I believe that new exciting fields such as personalized medicine and interventional technologies must be integrated with classic comprehensive interdisciplinary approach, which form the foundations of this specialty.”

Technological and scientific advances point to new and emerging treatments for previously incurable diseases.

Describing his vision for the specialty section, Dr. Dwolatzky states: “My dream is that the Geriatric Section will become a publishing platform for many – for clinicians caring for older patients, for scientists studying the core of the aging process, for researchers searching for improved diagnosis and treatment of the geriatric syndromes, and for those striving to improve the health of a rapidly aging population.

“I would like to see this section host interesting case presentations, basic science studies relating to aging, clinical and epidemiological research, and state of the art reviews. And all this be will readily available to readers from all over the globe.”

We look forward to working with Dr. Dwolatzky who shares our passion for open and transparent peer review process that allows reviewers to work together with authors to improve the manuscript before it is published. See full mission statement of the Geriatric Medicine section of Frontiers in Medicine. Learn more how to submit the paper to the section and follow us on Twitter @FrontMedicine.

Oksana Parylo, PhDJournal Operations AssistantFrontiers in Medicinemedicine@frontiersin.org