GSA Fellow Chosen to Lead JAMA Internal Medicine

By CEO James Appleby, BSPharm, MPH

Congratulations are in order for Dr. Sharon Inouye, the long-time GSA member and fellow who was recently named editor-in-chief of the prestigious journal JAMA Internal Medicine! The position will be effective July 1.

It’s great to see a member of the GSA family earn a distinction like this. The journal has an impressive impact factor of 44.4, and it’s widely regarded as an international peer-reviewed title providing innovative and clinically relevant research for practitioners in general internal medicine and internal medicine subspecialties.

Dr. Inouye is currently a professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and the Milton and Shirley F. Levy Family Chair, and director of the Aging Brain Center, Marcus Institute for Aging Research at Hebrew SeniorLife. She’s an internationally recognized leader in internal medicine, geriatrics, and aging research.

Her work focuses on delirium and functional decline in hospitalized older patients. She developed and validated the Confusion Assessment Method, the most widely-used instrument for the identification of delirium, translated into over 19 languages. She also developed the Hospital Elder Life Program, a multicomponent intervention strategy designed to prevent delirium by targeting six delirium risk factors. And now she’s the principal investigator of the Successful Aging after Elective Surgery study, a $13 million program project on delirium and dementia funded by the National Institute on Aging.

Dr. Inouye was previously honored by GSA in 2015 with our M. Powell Lawton Award, which “recognizes a significant contribution in gerontology that has led to an innovation in gerontological treatment, practice or service, prevention, amelioration of symptoms or barriers, or a public policy change that has led to some practical application that improves the lives of older persons.”

JAMA Internal Medicine chose wisely in its appointment of Dr. Inouye, and we can all be proud to know that someone with a background in gerontology will be bringing her expertise to this prominent role.