Delirium is one of the most important geriatric syndromes, and its potentially unfavourable prognosis is increasingly being recognized. At least 10-20% of older people who are treated in hospitals are affected by it, but dementia and delirium are also frequently encountered in residential care facilities as well.Delirium is discussed in this book in relation to its range of symptoms, classification, and also etiology and pathogenesis. Diagnostic and therapeutic procedures are discussed on the basis of current evidence-based knowledge. Individual chapters are concerned with delirium in diseases of dependency, as well as the current state of knowledge on how to prevent delirium. Numerous case reports, tables and illustrations - along with a discussion of current health-policy issues that go beyond delirium and are relevant for geriatrics as a whole - give the book a close link to practical work for everyone involved in geriatrics and gerontopsychiatry.

The authors have been concerned with this interdisciplinary topic for many years in their work in hospitals, research and teaching. Adjunct Prof. Christine Thomas and Prof. Walter Hewer are directors of departments of gerontopsychiatry in large hospitals. Until his death in 2015, Dr. Lutz Michael Drach was the Chief Physician in the Department of Geriatric Medicine in Schwerin.