Named a way to recognize the onset of early dementia

Depression, psychosis, vision impairment, and coordination disorders may indicate the development of early dementia. This was reported to The Conversation by psychiatrist and medical sciences candidate Molly Murray from the University of West Scotland.

According to the specialist, although dementia is most often associated with elderly people, the disease can also manifest in patients younger than 65 years. In rare cases, some forms of dementia are diagnosed even in children.

Murray emphasized that dementia is not a single disease, but a general term for a range of conditions associated with brain damage and cognitive decline.

"In elderly people, the main cause of dementia is most often Alzheimer's disease - it accounts for 50 to 75% of all cases. However, in patients younger than 65 years, only about 40% of cases are caused by this disease. In others, dementia is caused by other, less known forms, which often manifest in non-standard ways," the doctor explained.

In young people, dementia may begin not with memory problems, but with motor coordination disorders, vision changes, difficulties with speech, perception of objects, and spatial orientation. Delusions and hallucinations are also possible, which are often mistakenly regarded as manifestations of mental illness.

In addition, early dementia is often disguised as depression, anxiety, or bipolar disorders. In women, symptoms may be mistakenly taken for signs of menopause or emotional burnout. Because of this, both patients and doctors often do not associate such changes with deteriorating cognitive functions, which makes it difficult to make a correct diagnosis at an early stage.