Alasdair MacLullich

Professor of Geriatric Medicine

  • Usher Institute
  • College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine

Contact details

Address

Street

Ageing and Health
Centre for Population Health Sciences
Usher Institute, Usher Building
The University of Edinburgh
5-7 Little France Road
Edinburgh BioQuarter ‒ Gate 3

City
Edinburgh
Post code
EH16 4UX

Biography

Background

Alasdair M. J. MacLullich is Professor of Geriatric Medicine at the University of Edinburgh and an honorary consultant physician. His research is on delirium — an acute, common and frequently missed disturbance of mental function that affects around a quarter of older hospital inpatients and is associated with longer stays, loss of independence and later dementia.

He led the development of the 4AT in 2011, with Tracy Ryan and Helen Cash, and has maintained it since. It is now recommended by NICE, has been validated in more than thirty studies and translated into more than twenty languages, and is used in health systems worldwide. He is Editor-in-Chief of the journal Delirium, chairs the Scottish Hip Fracture Audit, co-founded the European Delirium Association in 2006 and served as its President from 2012 to 2015, and co-chaired the committee that produced Scotland's SIGN guideline on delirium. His book for families of people with delirium, written with Dr Sharmella Summan, is published in 2026.

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