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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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The decisive moment
— caregivers' recognition of dementia | | Author(s) | Linda O Nichols, Jennifer Martindale-Adams |
| Journal title | Clinical Gerontologist, vol 30, no 1, 2006 |
| Pages | pp 39-52 |
| Source | http://www.tandfonline.com |
| Keywords | Dementia ; Recognition ; White people ; Black people ; Informal care ; Attitude ; Diagnosis ; Social surveys ; United States of America. |
| Annotation | Caregivers of people with dementia often recognise the "decisive moment" in hindsight. This investigation aims to provide insight into the process of the caregiver becoming aware of the disease. Participants were 100 caregivers of Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients from the Memphis site of the Resources of Enhancing Alzheimer's Caregiver Health (REACH 1). These caregivers had a mean age of 67.5 years, were 81% female, 55% married to care recipients, and 63% White/Caucasian and 37% Black African American. They were surveyed about early signs of dementia, time between first sign and diagnosis, and when they knew that their care recipient's memory changes or problems were pathology rather than signs of normal ageing. Safety issues were the most common decisive moment (30.7%). Driving problems were both the most reported safety symptom (53.8%) and overall decisive moment symptom (16.5%). The decisive moment does not usually occur early in the disease, and often comes in the form of a crisis response to a safety issue. There are generally multiple clues before the decisive moment. The goal should be to provide education and support to help families to recognise as soon as possible the difference between normal ageing and pathology and potentially diminish the the safety and emotional impact of the decisive moment. This is the third of four articles in a special section on driving and older adults in this issue of Clinical Gerontologist. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-070413210 A |
| Classmark | EA: 4AD: TKA: TKE: P6: DP: LK7: 3F: 7T |
Data © Centre for Policy on Ageing |
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| ...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing. |
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