Handling dementia: A caregiver’s guide
Around six million Americans have Alzheimer’s disease, and that number is expected to reach 15 million by 2060. In 2017, 47 million more had preclinical AD; they suffer neurodegeneration and/or amyloidosis, the beginnings of those amyloid tangles that are thought to (sometimes) characterize AD. And around six million in the U.S. and Canada have a non-AD dementia that affects behavior and may cause apathy, disinhibition, personality changes and loss of executive function — that is, the ability to plan ahead and get organized — like Parkinson’s disease or primary progressive aphasia syndromes (affecting speech) or a form of dementia that can happen as a result of vascular disease, high blood pressure, stroke, diabetes or idiopathic normal pressure hydrocephalus (iNPH).
But dementia affects far more people than that. Loved ones, caregivers, friends and family all are affected. One study in JAMA found that caregivers 66 and older were at a 63 percent increased relative risk of dying than non-caregivers. And AgingCare.com says that fully 30 percent of caregivers die before the person for whom they are caring.
The strain, anger, guilt, remorse and stress are devastating and make it harder on both the patient and the caregiver.
That’s why a new Florida Atlantic University College of Nursing study is so groundbreaking. The researchers designed and tested a program to facilitate communication between people suffering from dementia and their caregivers. The results of their 10-week study have been promising for both.