Just Because Mom Hasn’t Wandered YET – Doesn’t Mean She Won’t! – Memory Impairment and Wandering – Mary Underwood
Familiar surroundings don’t always stay that way for those with cognitive issues. Recognizing ones home, neighborhood and family may have been replaced with memories of ones childhood or at least some long ago time. Every year, adults with memory impairment wander away from home and their caregivers. The statistics are frightening if not found with 24 hours. There are more than 50,000 open cases of missing seniors who wandered away.
Recognizing the warning signs and accepting the reality that just because it hasn’t happened does not mean it won’t. Mary Underwood, Life Guidance Program Director at Atria in Stratford, CT has over 22 years of experience in dementia care. Her recent presentation on this topic prompted us to have her share her knowledge with yet a larger audience. 2/20/11
READING, RESEARCH & LINKS
More With Dementia Wander From Home
The Mysteries of Dementia-Driven Wandering
Wandering – Alzheimers Association
What Broke My Father’s Heart
How putting in a pacemaker wrecked a family’s life. When (the doctor) suggested the pacemaker for the second time, my father was too stroke-damaged to discuss, and perhaps even to weigh, his tradeoffs. The decision fell to my mother — anxious to relieve my father’s pain, exhausted with caregiving, deferential to doctors and no expert on high-tech medicine. She said yes. One of the most important medical decisions of my father’s life was over in minutes.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/20/magazine/20pacemaker-t.html
Nun's Brains – Long term studies are a regular part of medical research
Long term studies are a regular part of medical research. Finding the right subjects can be difficult. Listen how an order of nuns has dramatically assisted Alzheimer’s research.
Alzheimer's Disease
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alzheimer%27s_Disease
http://healthlibrary.brighamandwomens.org/Library/Encyclopedia/85,P00772
In Early Alzheimer's, When to Give Up the Car Keys
It’s one of a family’s most wrenching decisions, and as Alzheimer’s increasingly is diagnosed in its earliest stages, it can be hard to tell when a loved one is poised to become a danger.
Dietary fish and meat intake and dementia in Latin America, China, and India: a 10/66 Dementia Research Group population-based study
http://www.ajcn.org/cgi/rapidpdf/ajcn.2009.27580v1
Large Study Points to the Brain Benefits of Eating Fish
Many studies have suggested that a diet rich in fish is good for the heart. Now there is new evidence that such a diet may ward off dementia as well. One of the largest efforts to document a connection — and the first such study undertaken in the developing world — has found that older adults in Asia and Latin America were less likely to develop dementia if they regularly consumed fish.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/21/health/21fish.html?ref=health
Dementia Diagnosis May Relieve Patients
Dementia Diagnosis May Relieve Patients – Do you want to know if someday you will develop Alzheimer’s? Washington University researchers wanted to quell physicians concerns over the effect on patients if they divulged their finding. You have to listen to find out the results or read the March 2008 Journal of the American Geriatrics Society.
070608earlyalzheimersdiagnosis
Side Effects We Don't Need…Common Drugs Harm Memory
Side Effects We Don’t Need…Common Drugs Harm Memory – Drugs used to treat ulcers, travel sickness, urinary incontinence and Parkinson’s are among those that may negatively effect memory in an older person according to a study by a neurologist at the Uniformed Services University
051108commonmedshavenegeffectonmemoryinelderly
What's the Best Time to Take Your Meds?
What’s the Best Time to Take Your Meds? Doesn’t matter when you take your prescriptions or supplements? Think again. Your body changes throughout the day and so do some diseases. Taken at certain times of the day, medications may be more effective or not effective at all.
