WHO predicts maha rise in dementia cases

Laxmi Rao first noticed there was something wrong with her mother three years ago, when she dropped her off at her sister’s — an oft repeated ritual — and her mother walked into the wrong building. It could’ve been an honest mistake, but there were other signs. Her mother, 75 at the time, would leave food cooking and forget about it. She would walk in to a room without a clue why she was there.

“It was little everyday things that she started forgetting,” says Rao, a masters in gerontology rushed her to a doctor, who “found that certain parts of her brain were affected by stage I Alzheimers.”

Unfortunately, Rao’s case is an exception rather than the rule in India. Working with Silver Innings Foundation (SIF), an NGO that cares for the elderly, Rao says, “Most families live in denial about their parents or grandparents getting dementia as they think memory loss is natural with advancing age. By the time they realise that something is seriously wrong, the disease progresses to a higher stage.”

In fact, apathy and lack of awareness is quite scary in a country where dementia among the 60+ is set to explode in the next 15 years. A recent study released by the WHO says that by 2026, Maharashtra is set to see a 112% increase (5.9 lakh) in dementia cases, “a silver tsunami of sorts” and “nobody seems to be worried”, says SIF director Sailesh Mishra.

What’s worse, we are hardly prepared for this sort of rapid increase in dementia cases, given that “there are only four centres in the entire city providing expert counselling for dementia cases”, says Mishra, while adding that, “The number of skilled counsellors who can work with such patients is also abysmally low.”

“Both counselling and therapy are integral to the tackle dementia, a neuro-degenerative condition,” says assistant professor of geriatric psychiatry Dr Alka Subramanian at Nair Hospital. According to Dr Subramanian, an ayah or a ward boy just don’t suffice. “The patients are often moody and get aggressive. Given their disorientation and confusion, one needs to be a trained counsellor to be able to guide them through this very difficult phase in their lives.”

While Rao gave up her full time job and began working from home to take care of her mother, experts lament lack of state measures. “Love is the best therapy that I can give my mother. I stimulate her brain with a strict daily routine and doing things like listening to old Hindi movie songs and reading the newspaper together,” says Rao.

Says Dr Subramanian, “We need more day care centres for the elderly and more trained counsellors, apart from hike in funds for research into dementia, which promises to shoot up.”