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Specialist Dementia Care for Severe Behaviours
A research collaboration between the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), UNSW Sydney and The Dementia Centre, HammondCare, has retrospectively reviewed the effectiveness of Special Dementia Care Programmes, for people with very severe behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia.
Behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) – which include hallucinations, anxiety, agitation, aggression, apathy and depression – occur in up to 90% of people living with dementia. These symptoms occur with greater frequency as the disease progresses.
It is estimated that less than 10% of Australians living with dementia will demonstrate aggressive behaviours that are deemed unmanageable in mainstream care, and only 1% will manifest very severe symptoms, indicating the necessity for specialist programmes to stabilise and reduce symptoms over time to enable transition back to a less intensive care setting.
Happiness of Centenarians a Severely Neglected Area of Research
A systematic review by researchers at the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), UNSW Sydney has highlighted the need for clearer definitions of ‘happiness’, ‘life satisfaction’ and ‘positive affect’ in centenarians. This is the first systematic review to summarise the literature on the subjective wellbeing of this unique age group.
The review, published in Aging & Mental Health, identified 18 studies that followed patients from several weeks to 18 years and looked at subjective wellbeing, comprising a cognitive component and an affective component.
The cognitive component is represented as ‘life satisfaction’ and the affective or mood component defined in relation to a person’s immediate emotional state.
Self-Reported Hearing Loss Linked to Increased Risk of Dementia
A six-year study of older Australians in CHeBA’s Sydney Memory and Ageing Study has uncovered an Australian-first association between the impact of hearing loss on cognitive abilities and increased risk for dementia.
In Australia, hearing loss affects 74% of people aged over 70. International studies estimate that people with severe hearing loss are five times more likely to develop dementia. Addressing midlife hearing loss could prevent up to 9% of new cases of dementia – the highest of any potentially modifiable risk factor identified by a commissioned report published in The Lancet in 2017.
A research collaboration between the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA), UNSW Sydney and Macquarie University’s Centre for Ageing, Cognition and Wellbeing has confirmed significant associations between self-reported hearing loss and cognition, as well as increased risk for mild cognitive impairment or dementia.