Karla/AdobeStockSPECIAL REPORT: GERIATRIC PSYCHIATRYAn overwhelming accumulation of evidence indicates that older adults have increases in both chronic medical conditions and so-called “medically unexplained” somatic symptoms.1 One example is the high prevalence of somatic symptom disorder (SSD) in older adults. Moreover, 20.4% of cases in older adults were classified as severe vs only 12.0% in younger adults.1 The extremely high rates of SSD, a psychiatric disorder, in older adults raise questions about the appropriate roles for psychiatrists and other mental health clinicians in treating somatic symptoms. In fact, receiving this diagnosis is excellent news, because these symptoms are treatable, even in older adults. Concluding ThoughtsPsychiatrists and other mental health clinicians have rarely attempted to directly address older adults’ somatic symptoms, despite their frequent co-occurrence with common psychiatric symptoms we do treat, such as depression and anxiety.1 Reasons could include assumptions that older adults’ somatic symptoms are necessarily biomedical and a lack of tools to accurately assess what symptoms are caused by the body and what symptoms by the brain. Chronic pain in older adults: a neuroscience-based psychological assessment and treatment approach.