How to Get a Person with Dementia to Eat

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There are many reasons why persons with dementia do not eat. Some of these reasons are, loss of vision, depression, being alone, swallowing difficulty, pain, being tired and digestion problems. Because of these difficulties, food may be no longer be appealing, or it may not taste good to them. Involving person with dementia in activities may spark their interest in

Have the person with dementia help you plan a meal from beginning to end. Determine what is going to be served. Get out some cookbooks and look up favorite recipes. Talk about the "good old days". Discuss their favorite recipes. Talk about special tricks in preparing certain foods. Help him make invitations for a special meal. Let him prepare a simple dish with as much assistance as needed. Let him taste the foods you are preparing. If he is unable to actively participate, let him observe the preparation, but still let him smell and taste the food you are preparing.

Making food that takes all day long to prepare in a slow cooker, fills the room with delightful smells that often increase a person's appetite. You can prepare a stew. The advantage to doing this besides creating the outstanding aroma, is that it is cost effective, and the food is soft and easier to eat.

You can also make a read all of How to Get a Person with Dementia to Eat

Walking to Save Your Brain

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Kirk Erickson, PhD, at the University of Pittsburgh in Pennsylvania, and his colleagues reported these findings in the October 13 issue of the journal, Neurology.

Dr Erickson found the results quite astounding. He said that other studies have shown that exercise is related to brain function, but what amazed him was the fact that he and his colleagues found that walking as little
as one mile a day is related to brain volume nine years later, and dementia 13 years later.

According to these researchers, the volume of gray matter in your brain decreases in late adulthood and usually precedes cognitive impairment. It has been hypothesized that participation in physical exercise will protect brain tissue against deterioration. "This hypothesis has not been tested in longitudinal study", Dr. Erickson and colleagues wrote.

In the Cardiovascular Health Cognition Study, 299 people free of dementia, whose mean age was 78 years were assessed for physical activity, which was measured by the number of blocks they walked in one week.

Nine years later after the physical activity assessment, MRI scans were used to measure brain size. Four years later, the participants were tested for cognitive impairment and dementia.

Those participating were classified into four groups depending on the number of blocks they walked. MRI scan measurements nine years later showed that gray matter volume in the highest quarter differed from the other three quarters significantly.

Those participants who walked at least six miles per week had more gray matter than people who walked less, but walking more than nine miles did not increase gray matter volume any more.

In the four year follow-up, 116 of the participants, or 40%, had developed cognitive impairment or dementia.

"Based on our results, we can conclude....read all of Walking to Save Your Brain

Why Validation Therapy Works for Those with Dementia

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Emotions are one of the last things to be lost in a person with dementia. Although not all aspects of validation therapy work for a person with dementia, understanding the concept of it is useful to the dementia caregiver. Some parts of validation therapy work for most people with dementia. You, as a caregiver, must discover what portions are effective for the person you are taking care of.

Dementia, a brain condition, is characterized by a group of symptoms that cause changes in the functioning of the brain. The changes have to do with thinking, perception and learning. These changes affect decision making, judgment, memory, spatial orientation, thinking, reasoning, and communication This condition interferes with daily life because of the seriousness of the changes in the brain of a person with dementia.. Behavior and personality problems most often occur. As we age, the likelihood of developing dementia increases. Validation therapy helps control problem behavior.

Time for a person with dementia can be....read all of Why Validation Therapy Works for Those with Dementia

Can Drinking Alcohol Postpone Dementia

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Many researchers and others interested individuals have been following news and research on memory loss, aging and how to delay the dementias for at least the last 35 years.

Lately there has been a lot of research on how to prevent, slow down or even reverse the effects of dementia.

The latest research suggests that read all of Can Drinking Alcohol Postpone Dementia

Could Alzheimer's Disease Start in the Liver

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Up until this point, it was thought that beta amyloid was made in the brain

A new study lead by research professor, Greg Sutcliffe, suggests that beta amyloid might... read all of Could Alzheimer's Disease Start in the Liver

Why you should become an Alzheimer's advocate

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You can make a difference by becoming an Alzheimer's advocate and contacting the representative, senator and governor of your state

Alzheimer advocates play an important role in improving the quality of care and quality of life for people with Alzheimer's disease and their families. They do this by working to improve dementia care and improve access to community-based care; improve quality care in residential settings; and expand funding for research and public programs serving people with dementia.

As an Alzheimer's advocate:

You will....read all of Why You Should Become An Alzheimer's Advocate

Medicaid: What is it

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How Medicaid Works

By Joseph L. Matthews,
What is Medicaid?
Medicaid is a federal government program to help provide healthcare coverage to certain categories of people who have low income and few assets (other than the home they live in). Among those covered by Medicaid are people over 65 and those with disabilities. Each state runs its own version of Medicaid, with slightly different rules and coverage.


Each week we'll send you Paying for Care news, tips and support for you and your family. Everything you want, nothing you don't!

The Medicaid program has several different parts:

Medicaid medical coverage includes most common forms of healthcare, as explained in this article. Medicaid medical benefits cover at least the same healthcare services that Medicare does, as well as some services that Medicare doesn't cover. Medicaid also pays Medicare premiums, deductibles, and co-payments for people who are enrolled in both programs.
A separate part of Medicaid covers long-term nursing home care.
Special Medicaid-funded programs cover long-term, in-home personal care. Income and asset eligibility rules for these long-term, at-home care programs are usually quite a bit looser than for regular Medicaid medical coverage.
In some states, a Medicaid-related program can pay some of the cost of assisted living.
Finding out about your state's Medicaid programs
To find out exactly what Medicaid and Medicaid-related programs operate in your state, what they cover, and who's eligible, contact a local office of your state's Medicaid program. To find a local Medicaid office, go to the federal government's Benefits.gov website and choose your state. This will take you to a page with contact information for your state's Medicaid program and information about local offices.

Medicare: How to enroll

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Enrollment is different for each part of Medicare. People who are receiving any type of Social Security benefits when they turn 65 will be automatically enrolled in Parts A and B. Medicare will send them enrollment cards and information about three months before their 65th birthdays. If they aren't automatically enrolled, they may sign up for Part A or Part B at any local Social Security office. They should enroll two or three months before they turn 65, to ensure prompt coverage.

If they delay enrolling in Part A past their 65th birthday, their coverage can date back to up to six months before the date they do apply. Delaying enrollment in Part B is more of a problem. If they wait more than three months after their 65th birthday to enroll in Part B, they may not enroll until January 1 of the following year, and the coverage won't start until July 1 of that year.

If they want to enroll in Part C or D of Medicare, they do so with the private managed care plan or insurance company that runs the particular plan or issues the policy they want. If they don't enroll in Part C or D when they turn 65, or if they want to switch coverage under Part C or D, they can do so during Medicare's annual enrollment period, which falls between November 15 and December 31. (Some managed care plans and insurance companies also allow enrollment throughout the year.)

Vaccine nasal spray may prevent Alzheimer's

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Now, researchers led by Dr. Dan Frenkel, Tel Aviv U, are working on a vaccine that promises to protect against Alzheimer’s and stroke by repairing vascular damage in the brain, even when symptoms of the disease are present. The drug works by inducing “an immune response against amyloid proteins in the blood vessels," says Frenkel, who adds, "In early pre-clinical studies, we've found it can prevent both brain tissue damage and restore cognitive impairment.” Plus, the drug may prevent hemorrhagic strokes. The vaccine has been successfully tested on animals and Frenkel is hopeful that this new approach may lead to a cure.

Mediccare: What is the cost

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Each part of Medicare has a different payment system. And within each part, patients' out-of-pocket costs will depend on the particular way they receive their benefits. However, the following basic information about premiums and copayments holds true in most cases. The figures given are for 2010.

Part A: Most people pay no premium for Medicare Part A. People who aren't automatically eligible for Part A pay a monthly premium of up to $461. Everyone with Part A pays a deductible of $1,100 for each period of hospitalization, and copayments for each day past the first 60 days of a particular hospital stay.
Part B: Every individual pays a premium of at least $96.40 a month for Part B coverage, deducted from monthly Social Security checks; this figure goes up for people with high incomes. A person must also meet an annual deductible of $155. After the deductible, Medicare pays 80 percent of the approved amount for covered doctor services, and 80 to 100 percent of the approved amount for outpatient services and medical equipment. Those who don't enroll in Part B when they turn 65 can enroll later -- but each year they put it off, the premium increases by 10 percent.
Part C: Part C Medicare Advantage private managed care health plans lump Part A and B together, offering one monthly premium and the plan's own set of copayments and deductibles. It's important to check not only premiums but also out-of-pocket costs when considering one of these plans.
Part D: Every prescription drug plan under Part D has different premiums, copayments, and coverages. In choosing a plan, be sure not to focus solely on the lowest monthly premium but also on coverage of the specific drugs needed and any copayments that might apply.
Where can I find more information about Medicare?

More detailed information about each part of Medicare is offered in the articles on this site listed below. You can also look at the federal website for Medicare and Medicaid, as well as at Benefits Checkup, an online service run by the National Council on Aging that can help you identify which government benefits your seniors qualify for and how to enroll.

Could this heart medication prevent dementia

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Carrental


Medical experts have said that drugs designed to help regulate heartbeats may cut the risk of Dementia.

The news comes after recent research regarding sufferers of atrial fibrillation (aka AF) suggested that patients treating the condition with certain drugs might also be dramatically cutting their chances of developing dementia. Experts say that after examining 50,000 AF sufferers it was determined that such patients have more than twice the risk of developing dementia after a stroke.

Recent studies on the matter were published in the Neurology journal, in which scientist now say that in-depth research need to be conducted to determine which AF drugs could be affective in delaying or preventing dementia and if they should be used for that purpose.

Atrial Fibrillation affects more people than any other heart condition. Rebecca Wood said on behalf of Alzheimer’s Research UK said that research was needed urgently on the matter. She said that it wasn’t yet known for sure if AF treatments will delay or prevent the onset of dementia in such a high-risk group.

Medicare: What is NOT covered

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Medicare isn't intended or designed to provide long-term nursing home or in-home care, so there are significant gaps in these areas. Families can't rely on Medicare to pay for 24-hour at-home care, meals, delivery services, and many of the personal services provided by home health aides (except for some skilled nursing care for a short time if it's medically necessary ).

Although Medicare has added many preventive services to its coverage in recent years, many such routine care needs are not yet covered, including dental care, medical treatment outside the United States, routine foot care, glasses, and hearing aids. Medicare coverage for mental health treatment -- including depression, which is a growing issue among people over 65 -- is also significantly limited. And Medicare doesn't cover elective procedures, including cosmetic surgery.

Most important, make sure the doctors you have in mind accept Medicare, or the program won't pay for even covered costs. This is also true for outpatient care and home care, and for prescription drugs, which Medicare patients must buy from a pharmacy that participates in their particular Part D insurance plan

Medicare: Who can get it

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Most people qualify for all Medicare programs if they're 65 or older and are citizens or permanent residents of the United States. However, eligibility rules and availability are different for each plan within Medicare.

For Part A, people are automatically eligible without paying any premium if, in addition to the age and residency requirements, they worked and paid Social Security taxes for at least ten years. If not, they may still buy into Part A coverage for a yearly premium.
For Part B, every citizen and legal resident over 65 is eligible. Even if someone is under age 65, he or she may qualify for both Part A and B if he or she has been receiving Social Security disability benefits for two years or has a chronic kidney disease.
If they're eligible for Parts A and B, they can choose to receive that coverage through a Part C Medicare Advantage managed care plan, if a plan they like is available where they live.
Anyone eligible for Medicare may purchase a Part D prescription drug plan offered by private insurance companies in the state where they live.

Medicare:What does it pay for

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Medicare consists of four categories: Part A covers hospitalization, some skilled nursing facility and home health care, and hospice. Part B covers doctors' services and outpatient care such as X-rays, laboratory work, some home health care, physical and occupational therapy, and some preventive screening. Then there's Part C, also known as Medicare Advantage, which is Medicare received through a private managed care system such as an HMO (health maintenance organization) or PPO (preferred provider organization). When someone enrolls in a Medicare Advantage plan, they receive all the benefits of Medicare Parts A and B, as well as some additional coverage provided by the private plan. As with other managed care, however, Medicare Advantage plans limit where and how their members may receive care. Finally, there's Medicare Part D, which consists of private insurance plans that partially cover prescription drug costs.

There is much more so visit this site again

Medicare: What is covered

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Before a visit, it's essential to verify that the doctor or other provider accepts Medicare.


Medicare is intended primarily to provide coverage if when someone becomes ill or injured. This includes hospitalization, doctors' services, lab work, X-rays, hospice, and just about every kind of outpatient care, as well as some inpatient nursing facility and psychiatric care.

Over the years, however, Medicare has evolved to also cover a range of preventive and screening services through the Part B plan. Some of these services include cardiovascular screening; smoking cessation counseling; screening for breast, cervical, vaginal, colon, and prostate cancers; immunizations for flu, pneumococcal virus, and hepatitis B; diabetes screening and supplies; glaucoma tests; and a "Welcome to Medicare" physical exam. Most Medicare Part C managed care plans offer even more of these preventive and screening services.

For those who meet certain requirements for home health care, Medicare also pays for part-time nursing care; part-time health aides; speech, physical, and occupational therapy; and medical supplies and equipment such as bandages and wheelchairs.

Under Part D, the prescription drug benefit, Medicare covers part of the cost of approved generic and brand-name prescription drugs purchased at participating pharmacies.

Can parts of your brain switch function

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A study taken place by neuroscientists at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has suggested that the visual cortex of the brain can dramatically change its function to language.
It has always been thought that language develops in two highly developed areas of the brain known as Broca’s area and Wernicke’s area. Broca's area helps us to produce language, where Wernicke's area help to understand language. These areas specifically arrange cells and connect with other brain regions which uniquely suits them to process language, the study suggests.
Other functions such as hearing and vision have distinct processing areas of its own. But now, evidence exists that language processing can be flexible. Language processing shows some activity in the left visual cortex of blind people when reading Braille, for example. This area might now indicate full-fledged language processing skills.
Marina Bedny, an Institute post-doctoral associate and lead author of the study, said: "Your brain is not a prepackaged kind of thing. It doesn't develop along a fixed trajectory, rather, it's a self-building toolkit. The building process is profoundly influenced by the experiences you have during your development", she said in a Science Daily research report.
It is not clear why the visual cortex would be recruited for language processing, when the language processing areas of blind people already function normally.

Is It really Alzheimer's?

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Heathday News

New research suggests that diagnosing Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia is not always clear-cut, raising the possibility of misdiagnoses among many seniors.


The finding is based on an analysis of brain autopsies, which found that roughly half of those who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's before death did not, in fact, show evidence of the right degree of brain lesions to support the diagnosis.

"Diagnosing specific dementias in people who are very old is complex, but with the large increase in dementia cases expected within the next 10 years in the United States, it will be increasingly important to correctly recognize, diagnose, prevent and treat age-related cognitive decline," study author Dr. Lon White, of the Kuakini Medical System in Honolulu, said in a news release from the American Academy of Neurology.

The findings, which were released Feb. 23, are scheduled to be presented April 13 at the academy's annual meeting in Honolulu.

The researchers autopsied the brains of 426 Japanese American residents of Hawaii who had been, on average, 87 years old when they died. About half had been diagnosed with some form of dementia, typically Alzheimer's.

Among those whose brain lesion profile did not confirm an Alzheimer's diagnosis, the investigators did uncover evidence of other forms of dementia, including Lewy body dementia, vascular dementia, generalized brain atrophy and a range of non-specific forms.

The chances of a misdiagnosis, the researchers found, appeared to rise with the patient's age.

"Larger studies are needed to confirm these findings and provide insight as to how we may more accurately diagnose and prevent Alzheimer's disease and other principal dementing disease processes in the elderly," White noted.

Experts note that research presented at meetings has not been subjected to the same type of rigorous scrutiny given to research published in peer-reviewed medical journals.

Does hearing loss increase your chances of getting dementia

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Archives of Neuroloogy

Older adults with hearing loss appear more likely to develop dementia, and their risk increases as hearing loss becomes more severe, according to a report in the February issue of Archives of Neurology, one of the JAMA/Archives journals

Frank R. Lin, M.D., Ph.D., of Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions, Baltimore, and colleagues are studying hearing loss as it relates to dementia. They studied 639 individuals age 36 to 90 without dementia. Participants initially underwent cognitive and hearing testing between 1990 and 1994 and were followed for the development of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease through May 31, 2008.

Of the participants, 125 had mild hearing loss (25 to 40 decibels), 53 had moderate hearing loss (41 to 70 decibels) and six had severe hearing loss (more than 70 decibels). During a median (midpoint) follow-up of 11.9 years, 58 individuals were diagnosed with dementia, including 37 who had Alzheimer’s disease.

The risk of dementia was increased among those with hearing loss of greater than 25 decibels, with further increases in risk observed among those with moderate or severe hearing loss as compared with mild hearing loss. For participants age 60 and older, more than one-third (36.4 percent) of the risk of dementia was associated with hearing loss.

The risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease specifically also increased with hearing loss, such that for every 10 decibels of hearing loss, the extra risk increased by 20 percent. There was no association between self-reported use of hearing aids and a reduction in dementia or Alzheimer’s disease risk.

“A number of mechanisms may be theoretically implicated in the observed association between hearing loss and incident dementia,” the authors write. Dementia may be overdiagnosed in individuals with hearing loss, or those with cognitive impairment may be overdiagnosed with hearing loss. The two conditions may share an underlying neuropathologic process. “Finally, hearing loss may be causually related to dementia, possibly through exhaustion of cognitive reserve, social isolation, environmental deafferentation [elimination of sensory nerve fibers] or a combination of these pathways.”

“If confirmed in other independent cohorts, the findings of our study could have substantial implications for individuals and public health. Hearing loss in older adults may be preventable and can be practically addressed with current technology (e.g., digital hearing aids and cochlear implants) and with other rehabilitative interventions focusing on optimizing social and environmental conditions for hearing. With the increasing number of people with hearing loss, research into the mechanistic pathways linking hearing loss with dementia and the potential of rehabilitative strategies to moderate this association are critically needed.”