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Centre for Policy on Ageing | |
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Emotional impact of dementia diagnosis
— exploring persons with dementia and caregivers' perspectives | | Author(s) | Faranak Aminzadeh, Anna Byszewski, Frank J Molnar |
| Journal title | Aging & Mental Health, vol 11, no 3, May 2007 |
| Pages | pp 281-290 |
| Source | http://www.tandfonline.com |
| Keywords | Dementia ; Diagnosis ; Stress ; Attitude ; Informal care ; Qualitative Studies ; Canada. |
| Annotation | 30 patient/caregiver dyads attending a Geriatric Day Hospital Program in Ottawa, Canada participated in this qualitative exploratory study on the impact of dementia disclosure. Data sources included: audio tapes of diagnosis disclosure meetings; in-depth interviews with patients and caregivers within one week of disclosure; and focus group interviews with caregivers within one month. Patients exhibited a range of emotional responses which can be divided into three broad categories: responses suggesting a lack of insight and/or active denial of the diagnosis; grief reaction or emotional crisis related to the experience of actual or anticipated losses associated with dementia; and positive coping responses to maximise the disease outcome. Participants went through stages of emotional response to their diagnosis: not noticing symptoms, noticing and covering up, or noticing and revealing; diagnostic process and disclosure; confirming or shock; denial, crisis or maximising; disorganisation or adaptation. There is a need to develop a better understanding of the experience of people with dementia at the critical point of diagnosis disclosure, in order to design supportive interventions to maximise adaptive coping responses. (RH). |
| Accession Number | CPA-070614214 A |
| Classmark | EA: LK7: QNH: DP: P6: 3DP: 7S |
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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