Ask most doctors why men over 60 struggle, and you’ll get the same answers: blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes, arthritis.
All true. But not the whole truth.
The real struggle isn’t what shows up in your bloodwork. It’s what doesn’t show up at all.
At the recent World Conference of Family Doctors in Lisbon, experts from around the globe said the same thing in different words: aging is not just a medical condition. It’s a human condition.
Beyond Pills and Charts
Dr. Leon Geffen of Cape Town put it bluntly: “People are living longer, but the years lived without disability are not keeping up.” The real problem isn’t access to care—it’s quality of care. Too many interventions miss the point.
Why? Because they treat men like a cluster of diagnoses, not as whole people with hopes, fears, and responsibilities.
That’s where the World Health Organization’s ICOPE protocol comes in. Instead of measuring only numbers, it screens for five areas:
Mind (cognition)
Mobility (movement and fall risk)
Vitality (energy)
Senses (hearing and vision)
Mood (psychological well-being)
And here’s the kicker: it asks what matters most to you. Not just what the doctor wants to fix.
The 5Ms: A Simpler Way
In the Philippines, where geriatricians are scarce, they’ve boiled this down to something called the 5Ms model:
Mind – memory checks
Mobility – fall risk
Medications – simplify the pillbox
Multi-complexity – acknowledge caregiver stress
Matters Most – your priorities, not just the doctor’s
That last one is the secret ingredient. Because the real reason so many men over 60 struggle isn’t just declining health… it’s losing control over their own story.
Health vs. Humanity
Dr. Roshni Ganguly from India shared the case of a 78-year-old man caring for a sick wife. His numbers—blood sugar, blood pressure—were important. But his environment, fatigue, and loneliness mattered just as much.
This is what most healthcare systems miss: aging isn’t about surviving. It’s about continuing to live with dignity, connection, and purpose.
What This Means for You
For men like us, the enemy isn’t only arthritis, hypertension, or blood sugar. The enemy is invisibility—being reduced to a chart, a patient ID, or “the old guy” who needs managing.
The truth? You are not a diagnosis. You are still a man with things that matter. Your story. Your independence. Your place in the world.
That’s why the best medicine isn’t always found in the pillbox. Sometimes it’s found in the questions that start with: What matters most to you right now?