Most patients over the age of 65 find the term ‘old’ upsetting and want their doctors to describe them as ‘seniors’ or ‘elders’, a study suggests.

GPs have long struggled with the challenge of finding appropriate language to discuss the ageing process in respectful terms that avoid offending their patients of advancing years.

And a poor choice of words could discourage some patients from accessing care, especially if a service is explicitly targeted at ‘frailty’ or ‘geriatrics’, say the authors of a report on the subject commissioned by primary health networks in Victoria.

Researchers surveyed 231 patients from northern Melbourne to ask how they felt about their doctors using words like ‘aged’ and ‘elderly’.