Centre for Policy on Ageing



Revealing a hidden problem — an evaluation of a community dementia case finding program from the Indian 10/66 dementia research network
Author(s)	K S Shaji, N R Arun Kishore, K Praveen Lal
Journal title	International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, vol 17, no 3, March 2002
Pages	pp 222-225
Keywords	Dementia ; Diagnosis ; Medical workers ; In-service training ; Evaluation ; India.
Annotation	Despite high levels of strain, families in India seldom seek help when a family member has possible dementia. The authors describe a case finding method for local community health workers in rural Kerala to identify possible cases of dementia. Diagnoses were then verified by a senior local psychiatrist. The community health workers identified 51 out of 1979 over 60s (a prevalence of 2.6%) as suspected cases of dementia. Following psychiatrist's assessment, 33 met DSM-IV criteria for dementia. Most of the confirmed cases were of the Alzheimer's disease (AD) subtype. Most "non-cases" were found to be suffering from other major psychiatric disorders, with substantial unmet need. The positive predictive value of informal screening by community health workers was 64.7%, suggesting a cost-effective method for other developing countries. (RH).
Accession Number	CPA-020327210 A
Classmark	EA: LK7: QT: QWD: 4C: 7FA
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...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing.