Upstate Medical University has become one of only a handful of academic medical centers in the United States to have a department devoted to geriatrics. For the past 20 years, the branch of medicine dealing with the health and care of older adults has been a division, or subset of a department, at Upstate. That division was led by Sharon Brangman, MD, who is a State University of New York distinguished professor and a former president of the American Geriatrics Society. She explains the significance of her specialty having its own full-fledged department, which she will lead.