Forgetting names is not enough to predict mental decline. Behavioral and personality transformations are more worrying. It is talked about in the Corriere Salute on newsstands for free on Thursday 17 February with the Corriere della Sera
We are publishing a preview of an article in the new Corriere Salute. You can read the full text in the free issue on newsstands Thursday 17 February or in Pdf on the Digital Edition of the Corriere della Sera.
IS common experience that as the years go by, especially after sixty, the memory begins to fail. Particularly evident may be the difficulty in remembering names of people or even of objects. A phenomenon that does not fail to worry, not only for the embarrassments it can create, but also because one inevitably questions the meaning of these mnemonic failures: they could be a first announcement of future worsening, clinical forms of cognitive impairment or even dementia. ?
Fortunately, there is no foregone relationship between memory hindrances due to aging and actual cognitive disorders. “Only some of the people who present these phenomena will later be given a diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment, also known by the English term Mild cognitive impairment ( MCI)» dice Diego de Leo, emeritus professor of psychiatry at Australian Griffith University and elected president of the Italian Association of Psychogeriatrics. “This condition is indeed feared as a prodromal stage of dementia. From a public health point of view, grasping its characteristics in elderly subjects can then be used to implement any prevention strategies “.
The diagnosis
For a diagnosis of true Mild Cognitive Impairment to be made, it is necessary that some specific symptoms are presentformulated several years ago by the neurologist at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Ronald Petersen.
“The diagnosis is based on the fact that the person complains of a decline in his cognitive performance,” says De Leo. «An impression of decline that must also be confirmed by a relative or a cohabitant, but also by specifici test neuropsicologici, which show an objective cognitive impairment in at least one of the domains explored. For it to be Mild cognitive impairment and not more serious forms, however, it is at the same time necessary for the person to be independent in functional skills, that is, to have fewer than three impediments in areas such as shopping, using the telephone, using drugs, and other daily activities. Finally, obviously, he must not already have a diagnosis of dementia ».
You can continue reading the article in Corriere Salute on newsstands for free on Thursday 17 February or in Pdf in the Digital Edition of Corriere della Sera.
February 15, 2022 (change February 15, 2022 | 19:44)
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