News release
14 March 2003
Overcoming Dementia Misdiagnosis In Developing Countries
Alzheimer's Disease International's 10/66 Dementia Research Group has developed and tested an assessment technique for diagnosing dementia in developing countries to overcome illiteracy barriers. The 10/66 Group's study, published in The Lancet (15 March 2003), shows that using standard assessments techniques on people with low levels of education, literacy and numeracy skills can result in a misdiagnosis of dementia.
The 10/66 Dementia Research Group aims to estimate the number of people with dementia in countries and regions where this has not been studied. In order to produce reliable and comparable figures, the 10/66 Group identified an assessment technique to diagnose dementia, ensuring a fair comparison between the different countries, cultures and levels of education studied.
Professor Martin Prince, epidemiologist at the Institute of Psychiatry, London (UK) and co-ordinator of the 10/66 Dementia Research Group said "Producing accurate and reliable statistics is critical if we want to alert governments to the numbers of people with dementia in their countries and to the fact that more and more people will develop dementia as the world's population ages rapidly. Many governments still do not recognise, let alone provide services for, people with dementia and their carers."
Elizabeth Rimmer, executive director of ADI said "There are an estimated 18 million people in the world with dementia. We need more good quality, accurate research to generate awareness. Greater awareness will help ADI's member Alzheimer associations lobby their governments and shape policy for people with dementia and their carers."
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