Sidney Katz
Sidney Katz
20.02.1918 - 18.06.2009 (91 years) (Marion County, Indiana, USA)
Sidney Katz, MD (1924–May 4, 2012) was a pioneering American physician, scientist, educator, author, and public servant who developed the Index of Independence of Activities for Daily Living (ADLs) in a career spanning more than sixty years. He made several other advances in geriatric care, including the U.S. Nursing Home Reform Act of 1987, which established basic rights for nursing home residents. Katz received several public and private awards, including the Maxwell A. Pollak Award (1993) and the American Geriatrics Society’s (AGS) Foundation for Health in Aging (2001). The AGS award was also won by former US President Jimmy Carter and poet Maya Angelou.Katz held several academic positions, including Professor Emeritus of Geriatric Medicine at Columbia University, and distinguished scholar at the Benjamin Rose Institute on Aging. He was a lifetime member of the National Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Medicine (IoM), serving as the head of IoM’s Committee on Nursing Home Regulation from 1983 to 1985. During his time leading the committee, Katz initiated a review of current nursing home conditions; the committee developed a report that recommended an extensive redesign of nursing home policies, regulations, and standards. These recommendations were adopted into Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1987 (OBRA-87), commonly known as the Nursing Home Reform Act of 1987, which mandated standardized nursing home patient rights and enforced new regulatory requirements to ensure equal treatment of nursing home residents.Katz worked until the age of 87, retiring in 2011. He died at home on May 4, 2012.