The article covers various forms of agitation and delirium that a psychiatrist must deal with in a non-psychiatric workplace. They result from the increase of the population mean age both in the hospitals as well as in the social care institutions and of the mental diseases of the elder age within the co morbidity. It explains the role of the consultation psychiatry and the role of the psychosomatic medicine. It deals with the historical point of view and forensic standpoints of the actions under which the agitation and delirium were treated in our conditions and in some EU countries. In thinks of the dignity of ill person – mainly the elder one – whether a medicalisation of the problem is the most suitable solution and what the best approach toward this problem would be.

        Key words: agitation, delirium, non-psychiatric workplace, institutions of social care, psychosomatic medicine.