ASSESSMENT OF PATIENT WITH DEMENTIA

Assessment of Patient with Dementia (Alzeimers Disease)

Assessment of Patient with Dementia (Alzeimers Disease)

Introduction

Alzheimer's disease is a chronic and irreversible neurodegenerative disorder, in which alterations occur early in declarative memory, in the spatial and temporal location. In the late stages, it presents a severe dementia accompanied by motor impairment. Alzheimer's disease primarily affects the olfactory neurons. Two other indicators early Alzheimer's disease, one of which may appear 10 to 20 years before the onset of the disease obvious, is an early decline in the capacity of the memory, the second in the APOE e4 (a genetic marker) and therefore present at birth. When both are present in a person, the possibility of developing Alzheimer's is greater (Hofman, Breteler, et al., 2008).

Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia, which is not a disease itself but rather a group of symptoms that involve a loss of intellectual function severe enough to interfere with daily activities. Formerly called senility, dementia was once thought to be a normal and almost inevitable component of aging. Today many doctors and researchers believe that dementia occurs in the elderly only when they are afflicted with specific diseases or disorders. Some of these disorders—including nutritional deficiencies (such as B12 deficiency), drug reactions, depression, thyroid disorders, and alcoholism—are potentially reversible. The dementia caused by Alzheimer's disease cannot be reversed, however, and ultimately results in a loss of the ability to care for oneself. Other causes of dementia, some of which are reversible, include multiinfarct dementia (caused by vascular disease and multiple strokes), Parkinson's disease, Huntington's disease, Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease, and Pick's disease, as well as infections such as meningitis (inflammation of the membrane surrounding the brain and spinal cord), syphilis, and AIDS (Dash & Villemarette, 2005).

On average a person with Alzheimer's lives about 8 years beyond the time of the initial diagnosis, with some people living 20 years or more. However long the survival time, symptoms continue to worsen over the years, and the patient becomes increasingly susceptible to infections and other illnesses, which are often the direct cause of death.

In this paper, we will be discussing alzheimer's disease, and its tool which are Mini-Mental State Examination and Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-Revised. In this study, we have mentioned about antipsychotic drugs and medications. Furthermore, Alzheimer's Disease in India and United Kingdom, current research on alzheimer's disease and importance of its asssesment has been discussed.

Tools - ACER and MMSE

Typically, screening tools measuring different constructs of mental status are used for identification of individuals with cognitive deficits in a time efficient way. Examples of screening tools include the Mini-Mental State Examination, Alzheimer's disease Assessment Scale and Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination-Revised among others (Proenca et al, 2008).

The ACE-R incorporates the five sub-domains including orientation/attention, memory, verbal fluency, language and visuospatial tasks. The Telugu adaptation of ACE-R designated as ACE-R (TA) has been validated in Telugu speaking literate and illiterate populations.

MMSE Examination

The MMSE is a popular screening tool for identification of individuals with cognitive deficits and evaluates orientation to ...