1. What dementia brought into my mind Dementia is a common syndrome found among elderly over the globe. Talking about dementia, the first word emerge from mind is “loss”. Learning about the disease manifestation, it is known that dementia does bring a huge impact to the affected senior so as the caregiver. Many of us used to focus on the losses of dementia client which indeed causing a labeling effect. Remembered in the first lesson, a question “As a case manager, what will you do to help the client with dementia and the family?” was asked. I realized my answer is “Refer the client to suitable care unit”. It seems that my original thought deprived the elderly as I failed to think of other better solution like assisting them to age in the community. Although dementia leads to certain kinds of loss to people with dementia, their needs and strengths should not be neglected. Institutionalization thus may not the best solution. To serve the elderly, I need to modify my thought by adopting a strength-based approach. Practice should not mutually focus on the losses, but to explore more on the possibilities. Boosting the quality of life is also an important issue, empowering the client by bear in mind that “we are not only work for the service users, but work with them”. 2. Explanations of disease manifestation The disease manifestation of dementia is classified as the cognitive impairment and the non- cognitive impairment. For cognitive impairment, it mainly covers five types of impairment which include the impairment of memory function, attention and concentration, orientation, executive function and also language skills. It is identified that Tommy has four types of those excluding the language skill impairment which characterized by aphasia. For impaired memory function, it is found that he has impairment of episodic short-term memory. The symptom caused him find hard
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Show MorePeople with dementia may be subject to mistreatment and abuse in the community or in care homes and hospitals. Those with dementia can be more vulnerable to abuse as they may find it difficult to discuss their feelings and experiences or remember what happened to them. Dementia can also make it harder to detect abuse.
“Dementia is the progressive deterioration in cognitive function - the ability to process thought” (Nordqvist, 2009, para. 1) and can be separated into two main categories: cortical and subcortical, physically speaking; for example, Alzheimer’s disease is a type of cordical dimentia, while Parkinson’s disease is classified as subcortical in nature. Many of the people suffering from these afflictions, which are usually middle-aged and older, appear to lose the ability to recall particular events, time of day, or in more advanced stages, the identity of their friends and family. Other symptoms of this condition have been reported as difficulty with speech, depression, balance issues and general disorientation.
tends to increase with age, but there is a big difference between normal forgetfulness and Alzheimer's disease. There are three things to know about Alzheimer's: the facts and figures, the seven stages, and the changes in the brain.
(http://www.helpguide.org/elder/alzheimers_dementias_types.htm) As people get older, it’s not all that uncommon to experience some changes in memory such as memory loss. However, there is a big difference in having normal changes in memory and having symptoms of Dementia. Typical aging changes in memory include things like not being able to find the right word when having a conversation and complaining about memory loss but still being able to give detailed examples of things that are being forgotten. A few more signs of typical aging are stopping to remember directions but not getting lost in a familiar place, being able to remember recent events that are important and the conversation isn’t affected, and having the same level of interpersonal social skills that have always been present. On the other hand, there are more extreme cases of memory loss that are symptoms of Dementia. These include things like complaining about memory loss only when asked about it and not remem...
Alzheimer's disease is a disease of the brain. This may be considered a steady loss of memory and other mental functions. Alzheimer's is the most common form of dementia; a term stating to loss of memory and the ability to think, reason, function, and behave properly (Clinic, 2013). The word dementia derives from two Latin words, which mean away and mind, respectively. It's different from the mild forgetfulness normally observed older people. Over the years of this disease, people with Alzheimer's disease no longer know who they are or know much about the world around them.
Dementia describes a chronic or persistent blend of symptoms that lead to the eventual decline in mental ability. Dementia’s symptoms are caused by brain disease and/or related injuries that can potentially lead to a decline in mental health that is extreme enough to interfere drastically with daily routines. At least two severe impairments of either; memory, communication, focus, perception and judgement are enough to be considered for the development of dementia. According to Alzheimer’s Australia1 - approximately over 353,800 Australian civilians have dementia, which is widely expected to increase to 400,000 in the next five years. Alzheimer’s Australia1 also believes that if a cure is not developed, the number of Australian’s living with dementia will increase to an approximate 900,000 by 2050.
“Loss” is the main thing many people think about when they think of dementia. Dementia is a term used to describe a disease that infects the mind of elderly people making them forget their memories and everyday activities. There are varying levels and extremes of dementia, meaning the disease affects people differently depending on how severe their specific case of dementia is. Fortunately, the disease does not happen immediately, it is a gradual process. The more time that passes, the more matured the disease gets. Also, dementia contributes to the loss of cognitive, psychological, and health related functions.
My participants ranged from the ages 60 to 65 (I was not allowed to get the exact age of the participants due to an agreement I made). The participants consisted of four males and three females. They still had the ability solve certain mental task like a puzzle. Two of the female participants had progressed so far in dementia that they needed assistance to solve the puzzle. All the male participants were able to solve the puzzle without any kind of assistance. They were all able to walk without the assistance of a cane or a walker. There were one skinny, one average, and five fat participants. The male participants either had or were starting to develop bald head and only one female participant had gray hair. There were six white patients and one African American patient who participated in the activity.
When a loved one begins showing early symptoms of dementia, there are many issues relating to independence, safety, and the individual's sense of self with which to cope. As dementia progresses, the person may have to give up living on his or her own, but during the earliest stages, a supportive family network and helpful memory aids can help them retain their independence for a bit longer.
Dementia is a disorder which results in loss of thinking, remembering, and reasoning to the extent where behavioral abilities interfere with a person’s daily life and activities. It is a set of symptoms affecting the brain which causes memory loss, starts slowly and increases with loss of the ability to function. In the beginning stages of dementia, a person can still function normally, but as the disorder progresses the activities such as driving, cooking, ironing or boiling a kettle of water becomes difficult, risky and should be monitored. The ability to focus and communicate is so confusing as to where they are, where they are going and sometimes starts wandering and get lost. It was so heartbreaking for me when my mom was diagnosed with
The chosen mental disorder is Dementia. Reading and learning about this disorder has helps me to understand some of the symptoms and problems patients and their family members go through when faced with this challenging and progressive disease. It will also help me in the future when working with individuals with various types of dementia. Dementia is not a specific disease. It is a general term describing the decline in mental ability that is severe enough to interfere with someone daily life. Alzheimer’s is the most common type of dementia. It accounts for 60 to 80 percent of dementia cases. The second most common dementia is vascular dementia. It occurs after a person had a stroke. There are other conditions that could cause symptoms of
Most individuals at some time or another, regardless of age, have walked into a room and forgotten what they intended to do. This trick of the mind can increase with age as well as other problems such as difficulty with vision, auditory, balance, and memory. While these are all common processes with aging, they may also be signs and symptoms of a more serious issue. Dementia can be defined as an illness preventing the ability to think clearly and differentiate between reality and fantasy.1 Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is often the foundation of dementia, responsible for 50-70% of the diagnosis’s.2, 3 This is a progressive disease that impedes memory and other mental functions.3
Dementia is referred to as a condition in which an individual’s everyday life is so fragmented and/or ripped away from reality that he or she loses the ability to reason and think clearly (Berk, 2014). According to Prince et al., 2013, dementia strikes 13% of adults over the age of 65 in the United States and other Western nations (as cited in Berk, 2014). Additionally, dementia causes an individual to experience persistent memory lapses and can be caused by many different reasons like the development of Alzheimer’s disease, stress, depression, PTSD, etc. With this in mind, Dasha Kipers’ article, “Hope Is the Enemy”, goes in depth about what it is like for an individual who suffers from dementia. Furthermore, the article begins in 2010 when Dasha moved into an apartment with a 98-year-old man named Mr. Schecter, who was a Holocaust survivor dealing with the beginning stages of dementia. As Dasha and Mr. Schecters relationship developed, Dasha began to realize Mr. Schecters behavior: putting laundry detergent in the oven, forgetting which floor he lived on, and Mr. Schecters repetitiveness. Thus, in the end of Dasha’s article, Dasha explains that dementia affects not only the victims, but the caregivers as well by making their lives fragmented, skewed, and redundant (Kiper, 2015). For that reason, dementia is seen as being a condition in which everyone involved in
There are many different causes of dementia. The types of dementias are based on the changes that occur in the brain and include vascular dementia, Alzheimer’s, Lewy body dementia and frontotemporal disorder. Alzheimer’s disease accounts for a very large population of dementia cases. The disease accounts for 60 to 80 percent of these cases, making it the most common form of dementia. Of the approximately 6.8 million Americans who have been diagnosed with dementia, over 5 million have been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease (Defina, Moser, Glenn, Lichtenstein, Fellus,2013). With an aging population by 2050 these numbers are expected to double. Alzheimer’s is the fifth leading cause of death in the United States. The increasing incidences of
Absentmindedness, with questions having to be repeated, trouble following conversations, or remembering people's names, sound familiar? These are classic early stage symptoms of Alzheimer's.