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Research by the Alzheimer Center Limburg of Maastricht UMC+ shows for the first time that there are 14,000-17,000 people in the Netherlands with dementia at a young age (before their 65th birthday). According to the researchers, more attention is needed for this condition, which has a major impact on patients and their environment.
Also in young people
Dementia is mainly associated with old age. However, dementia can also affect young people. Dementia can be caused by many different conditions. These all have in common that they result in changes in cognitive functioning, behavior or emotions that increasingly limit a person’s everyday life. Examples include memory, language limitations, performing actions or processing or understanding information.
Depending on the form of the dementia, other symptoms are prominent. Patients with Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia at a young age, are often limited in their ability to keep an overview and have problems acting or making themselves clear. Frontotemporal dementia, a form that occurs much more often in young people than in older people, is mainly characterized by changes in behaviour, personality and emotions or language problems.
Unrecognized problem
Due to the specific manifestations in combination with the young age, dementia is often only diagnosed after a long period of time. It is often thought that someone is stressed or depressed or has relationship problems. For individual patients and their families, this often means a long period of uncertainty, uncertainty, misunderstanding and sadness. It is also important from a social point of view that it is clear how big the problem of dementia at a younger age is.
With the aim of doing more and better research into dementia at a young age, the PRECODE project was started under the leadership of Prof. Dr. de Vugt of the Alzheimer Center Limburg of Maastricht UMC+. This project investigates the prevalence (what numbers) and incidence (how many new cases in a period) of dementia at a young age.
Global figures
A sub-study of the PRECODE project is the meta-analysis of international scientific literature on the incidence and prevalence of dementia in young people. This shows that there are almost 4 million people worldwide who have developed dementia at a young age. That means between 14,000-17,000 people with dementia at a young age in the Netherlands.
Researcher Stevie Hendriks about this: “Our figures show that this concerns a significant group of people who deserve special attention in science and care. Not only to make a diagnosis in time, but also to provide the right care and support. That is why it is a good step that dementia at a young age also has an important place in the national dementia strategy 2021-2030 of the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport.”
The study was published July 19, ’21 in the scientific journal JAMA Neurology.
Source: Maastricht University
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