Mini-Cog for dementia diagnosis in the community

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Clarissa Giebel writes her debut Mental Elf blog about a recent Cochrane systematic review of the Mini-Cog for the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease dementia and other dementias within a community setting.

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Prescribing antipsychotics in primary care: new study highlights frequent off-label use

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Josephine Neale reports on a recent cohort study that finds less than half of UK prescriptions for antipsychotics are issued for main licensed conditions (e.g. psychosis or bipolar disorder). The research provides a reminder about the dangers of prescribing antipsychotics to people with dementia.

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'The terrible maze': Dementia carers' experiences of health and social care

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Social care super-blogger Ermintrude considers a study about dementia carers’ experience of the health and social care system and reflects on what it means for current dementia policy.

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Cognitive impairment in dementia need not prevent shared decision making

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In her first blog for the Social Care Elf, Caroline Struthers looks at research on cognitive impairment and shared decision making for people with dementia and offers useful tips on understanding research reviews. She also shares some of her own personal experience of the research topic and reminds us about reliable evidence having real-life applications.

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'Strategies for Relatives': improving mental health for family carers of people with dementia

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In her latest blog, Clarissa Giebel examines research into the effectiveness of the ‘Strategies for Relatives’ psychological and educational training programme for family carers of people with dementia and explores what the findings might mean for wider programme implementation.

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Lifestyle changes for cognition and dementia: better than a new drug?

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Should all molecular research institutes looking at neurodegenerative diseases be replaced by parks, playgrounds and cycle paths? Mark Horowitz highlights a recent systematic review of modifiable risk factors associated with cognition and dementia, which suggests that from a public health perspective, there may be some sense in this idea.

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Advance care planning for people with advanced dementia

It's important that practitioners don't let dementia get in the way of other health problems, such as depression or anxiety. 

Clarissa Giebel, Researcher and PhD student at the University of Manchester, writes her debut Elf blog on a qualitative study about the experiences of advance care planning amongst family caregivers of people with advanced dementia.

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Risk factors for dementia: separating the facts from the myths

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We are grateful to Josephine Neale who has read the 104 page World Alzheimer Report 2014 and summarised it for us in this very readable blog. The report is a comprehensive analysis of the risk factors for dementia, which focuses on a range of protective and modifiable factors.

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Evidence to guide treatment of dementia in people with learning disability may be lacking, but new areas of research might help

As people with learning disabilities are living longer, then they are also experiencing age related disorders such as dementia, where they have been shown to have a higher risk than the general population. Here we look at a review of the current state of knowledge which looks at a range of issues, from prevalence, assessment, treatment and future directions for research.

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Medication in advanced dementia: how can we judge what is appropriate?

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Caroline Struthers appraises a recent US cross-sectional study of the use of medications of “questionable benefit” in nursing home residents with advanced dementia. She concludes that all medications are of questionable value if they have side effects which might have a negative impact on quality of life or are likely to cause harm.

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