Alzheimer's disease

Alzheimer’s Association Announces First Practice Guidelines for Primary Care

The Alzheimer’s Association (AA) has released new information on its first-ever clinical practice guidelines for primary care physicians evaluating Alzheimer disease, dementia, and neurodegenerative cognitive behavioral syndromes. The guidelines will be released later this year.

“Despite more than two decades of advances in diagnostic criteria and technology, symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease and Related Dementias (ADRD) too often go unrecognized or are misattributed…” the AA wrote. “Contributing to the variability and inefficiency is the lack of multidisciplinary ADRD evaluation guidelines to inform US clinicians in primary and specialty care settings.”

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The guidelines will include 20 recommendations for both primary and specialty care and were developed by a workgroup of experts from multiple disciplines in dementia care and research convened by the AA.

These 20 recommendations emphasize the importance of obtaining a history from both the patient and another individual who knows the patient well, in order to establish any substantial changes and categorize the cognitive behavioral syndrome, investigate causes, and communicate the findings and diagnosis and ensure ongoing management and care.

Core recommendations include:

  • All middle-aged or older individuals who report cognitive, behavioral, or functional changes should undergo evaluation.
  • Concerns should not be dismissed without proper assessment.
  • Evaluation should involve a care partner (family member or confidant).

“Too often cognitive and behavioral symptoms due to Alzheimer disease and other dementias are unrecognized, or they are attributed to something else,” said James Hendrix, PhD, Alzheimer’s Association Director of Global Science Initiatives and staff representative to the workgroup.

“These new guidelines will provide an important new tool for medical professionals to more accurately diagnose [Alzheimer disease] and other dementias. As a result, people will get the right care and appropriate treatments; families will get the right support and be able to plan for the future.”

—Michael Potts

Reference:

First practice guidelines for clinical evaluation of Alzheimer's disease and other dementias for primary and specialty care [press release]. Chicago, Illinois. July 22, 2018. https://www.alz.org/aaic/releases_2018/AAIC18-Sun-clinical-practice-guidelines.asp.