Advances in medicine and other sciences have increased the average chronological life span and
have improved the ability to provide early resuscitation and rescue efforts to those traumatically injured. The elderly (described as persons aged 65 years and older for the purpose of this discussion) face an increased risk of mortality and are prone to worse outcomes than younger persons when traumatically injured. This is likely due to multiple factors including comorbidity,
polypharmacy, and the physiologic effects of aging