Age has become a diagnosis meant to be treated, not a time of your life to enjoy living. More medicines, more specialists, more tests, more fear. We have transformed age itself into a disease as we measure and "fix'" everything we can find, a windfall for the medical industrial complex, but a tragedy for the trusting souls who are tossed into the medical fire. Alan and Andy use data and their collective 75 years of experience to show how errant this approach is. Slow medicine, a focus on function and symptoms, a leap away from tests and specialization are the ingredients of successful aging. We talk about all of this and how patients can get back on track, even if the medical system will likely continue to steamroll its older victims. In addition to our own book, Return to Healing, we highlight some other books that have explored the issue of slow medicine and the medicalization of aging:

• Byock, The Best Care Possible
• Sweet, Slow Medicine
• Lazris, Curing Medicare
• Hadler, Rethinking Aging
• McCullough, My Mother, Your Mother

It's important to know that your later years need not be spent chasing numbers and falling prey to the fearmongering of specialists and drug company propaganda. Work with your primary care doctor and let the medical system back off and help you to live well and long.