American journal of Alzheimer's disease and other dementias
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Am J Alzheimers Dis Other Demen · Jul 2004
Stress in the caregivers of Alzheimer's patients: an experimental investigation in Italy.
In Italy, the family constitutes the major caregiving response to the needs of the elderly who are no longer self-sufficient. These caregivers are often wives or daughters who have chosen to keep the patient at home with them. On average, three-quarters of the caregiver's day is devoted to the patient, a proportion that tends to increase linearly as the disease progresses. ⋯ The burden becomes heavier as the disease progresses, since the increase of cognitive disorders and the resulting reduction of independence in daily life, together with the onset of behavioral symptoms, heighten the caregiver's distress, anxiety, and depression. Establishing a network of community services able to alleviate the burden on families is therefore a priority. Parallels can be drawn between the stresses documented for American caregivers and their Italian counterparts.
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Am J Alzheimers Dis Other Demen · May 2002
Greek validation of the seven-minute screening battery for Alzheimer's disease in the elderly.
The increasing prevalence ofAlzheimer's disease (AD) suggests that there is an increasing need for accurate and easily administered screening instruments. The Seven-Minute Screen is a neurocognitive screening battery consisting of four brief tests (enhanced cued recall, temporal orientation, verbal fluency, and clock drawing). We studied 55 outpatients with probable AD, 40 healthy volunteers of comparable age, sex, and education and 31 elderly patients with other neuropsychological disorders. ⋯ Sensitivity was 81.25 percent and specificity was 96.55 percent using 0.7 as the cutoff probability, and 93.75 and 96.55 percent, respectively, using 0.5 as the cutoffprobability. Neither age nor education and gender had an effect on the results. The Seven-Minute Screen appears highly sensitive to AD patients and may be useful in helping to make initial distinctions between patients with early dementia and normal elderly.