Abstracts by keywords: risk factors
Results of a selective literature search
05.06.2023
Dementia is a psychiatric disease caused by neurodegeneration, characterized by a progressive loss of cognitive functions, leading to changes in patients' daily lives (WHO, 2015). 47.5 million people worldwide suffer from dementia, and this number is expected to rise to 75.6 million by 2030 and exceed 140 million by 2050 (WHO, 2015). In Germany, dementia affects around 1.2 million people, mainly women and seniors. Approximately 200,000 new cases are diagnosed every year (Tunstall, 2015). The average cost associated with these mental illnesses is more than 43,000 euros per patient per year, with almost 68% of this amount borne by carers and families (Tunstall, 2015). Dementia therefore has a significant impact on patients and their relatives, which underlines the need for specially adapted treatments and appropriate management of the disease in Germany.
31.03.2016
40 years ago, the WHO declared that at least 50 percent of diabetes cases worldwide could be prevented and - as can be read in the Diabetes Health Report 2013 (1, p. 23) - called for actions to prevent this disease. However, the call received little attention back then - much like it does today. Over these many years, the German healthcare system has invested billions to care for people with this disease. According to the CODE-2 study (2), the costs caused by patients with type 2 diabetes in Germany amounted to around 15.7 million euros in 1998 - which has since extrapolated to many hundreds of billions of euros. But: Despite this immense investment, why are there still deficits in diabetic care as one of the most cost-intensive chronic diseases? It is reasonable to assume that the fundamental problem of almost all “non-communicable diseases” - enabling the people affected to self-manage and motivating lifestyle changes - cannot be overcome with the current acute care approach alone.
24.01.2013
Aging in familiar surroundings is a great need for most people. The transition to a residential care facility, on the other hand, is often experienced as very stressful and is associated with considerable financial costs for those affected, their relatives and social security systems. If people develop dementia, one in two people move permanently into a residential care facility within the first three years of the onset of the illness. Whether and when a move to a residential facility is carried out depends on numerous characteristics of those affected, their relatives and external conditions. For a German sample of older people with incident dementia, the absence of a spouse in particular was identified as a strong risk factor for a shorter time before moving to a residential facility. In addition to identifying further - possibly modifiable - factors influencing the institutionalization rates and times of dementia sufferers, the aim of future research efforts should also be the development of target group-specific interventions for certain risk groups in order to - if sensible - ensure longer or optimal care for dementia patients in the home environment to be able to move into a home facility at the right time.