Juniper Publishers | Global Journal of Intellectual & Developmental Disabilities

Nonpharmacological Treatment for Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia in Alzheimer's Disease



Authored by Koji Hori

We are studying the Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of Dementia (BPSD) in Alzheimer's disease (AD). Firstly we investigated the effects of aging or disease progression on BPSD. According to patient age at the time of the test, the 79 AD patient group (n=79, whole AD group was divided into two groups: a relative Older Group (OG) and a relative younger group (YG). The diurnal rhythm was significantly higher in the OG than in the YG (Student's t-test: P<0.05). Factor analysis showed that in OG the psychotic symptoms were connected by anxieties and phobias [1]. Then the AD patients were divided into a group with higher performance (n=40, HP group) and a group with lower performance (n=39, LP group). The disturbance of activity and disturbance of diurnal rhythm were negatively correlated with cognitive function, while affective disturbance was positively correlated with cognitive function. Factor analysis showed that a mood cluster (affective disturbance plus anxieties and phobias) was associated with a psychiatric cluster (paranoid and delusional ideation plus hallucinations) and with aggressiveness in the LP group. We call the results as "implicit depression and explicit psychosis”. Moreover, the time of onset and test were not different between HP and LP. From these results, there may be two different causes of BPSD in AD patients. 

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