Karlin, Bradley E., Visnic, Stephanie, Shealy McGee, Jocelyn, Teri, Linda

Dementia is often associated with challenging behaviors that can significantly impact the quality of life of individuals with dementia and pose great difficulty for long-term care staff. Antipsychotic medications, historically the mainstay approach for managing such behaviors, have increasingly been associated with limited efficacy and increased death risk with older dementia patients. In an effort […]

Jesso, S., Morlog, D., Ross, S., Pell, M. D., Pasternak, S. H., Mitchell, D. G. V., Kertesz, A., Finger, E. C.

Patients with behavioural variant frontotemporal dementia demonstrate abnormalities in behaviour and social cognition, including deficits in emotion recognition. Recent studies suggest that the neuropeptide oxytocin is an important mediator of social behaviour, enhancing prosocial behaviours and some aspects of emotion recognition across species. The objective of this study was to assess the effects of a […]

Houser, Winona S., George, Daniel R., Chinchilli, Vernon M.

Objectives: To evaluate whether involvement in TimeSlips, a creative storytelling program, reduced mood and behavioral symptoms as well as psychotropic medication use in persons with dementia.; Methods: A cluster-randomized pilot study compared two discrete dementia care units in one nursing home. The control cohort (N = 10) received standard-of-care activity programming, and the intervention cohort (N = […]

Cumbo, Eduardo, Ligori, Leonarda Domenica

Background: Behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD) occur in up to 80% of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) patients and represent one of the most common reasons for early institutionalization and increase in management costs.; Objectives: This study evaluated the effects of four drugs (memantine, donepezil, rivastigmine, galantamine) in BPSD in AD patients.; Methods: This was […]

Anderson, Katrina, Bird, Michael, MacPherson, Sarah, McDonough, Vikki, Davis, Terri

There is increasing literature on multisensory therapy or Snoezelen, with some evidence suggesting it promotes positive mood and reduces maladaptive behavior in people with dementia. We undertook a pilot evaluation of a Snoezelen room in residential care and compared effects with a condition in which staff took residents out to a garden. This study was […]