Dementia Undiagnosed in Poor Older Adults with Functional Impairment

Abstract

Persons with dementia who were older and lived alone were less likely to be diagnosed by their PCP. Although persons not diagnosed by their PCP had less cognitive impairment, they had substantial impairment in activities, including handling finances, cooking, and managing medications.

An in‐home geriatric programme for vulnerable community‐dwelling older people improves the detection of dementia in primary care

“…We were able to confirm this in the group of patients with MMSE 18: 52% of them was not registered as a dementia case. This corresponded with literature that compared dementia diagnoses in medical records with the prevalence of dementia in primary care (Eefsting et al, 1996;Olafsdottir et al, 2000;Lopponen et al, 2003;Wilkins et al, 2007). We could not identify any patient or physician characteristics as predictor for the registration of dementia.…”

“…However, in primary care dementia is currently under-detected. Several American and European studies showed that 50% or more of the dementia patients are not diagnosed (Eefsting et al, 1996;Olafsdottir et al, 2000;Valcour et al, 2000;Lopponen et al, 2003;Wilkins et al, 2007). GPs indicate that they miss reliable, user-friendly screening tools to examine cognitive disorders (Waldorff and Moller, 2001).…”

Present Status and Road Map to Achieve Inclusive and Holistic Care for Dementia in a Japanese Community: Analysis Using the Delphi Method

“…When people in a vulnerable family become demented, they can neither access care by themselves nor be easily approached by care providers. Previous reports suggest that stigma and poverty become obstacles, and that people in society need to understand better and behave more sensitively toward patients with dementia [26,27,28,29,30]. Additionally, dementia patients often lack the recognition of their own illness at an early stage of the disease, which makes it more difficult for care providers to approach them [31,32,33,34].…”

Early Anticipation of Dementia; A Step Towards Promoting Community Health: Review of Current Evidence

“…In other words, there is a high probability of the development of dementia in people with cognitive problems in the coming years (2,11). Studies in high income countries show that only one-fifth to one-half of dementia cases are typically recognized and documented in primary care (12)(13)(14)(15)(16). This treatment gap is much greater in low and middle income countries; one study in India showed that 90% remain unidentified (17).…”