A large proportion of patients with dementia reaching a health centre are wrongly diagnosed.

-Navarra Basque society of Psiquiaría professionals address in Vitoria the keys to the future of psychiatric treatments

Vitoria, October 2011.- diagnosis of mental illness is not easy and more when they are in the initial stages. In the case of dementia, a large proportion of patients arriving at a health centre are mistakenly diagnosed, says Juan Medrano Albéniz, psychiatrist in the Psychiatric Hospital of Álava, Member of the society Vasco Navarra of Psychiatry.

Medrano has released these notes during Symposium I: life cycle, evolution and Grave Mental disorder, framed in the x meeting of the society Basque-Navarre of Psychiatry, which was held last week in the capital of Alava.

Focusing on the theme of the meeting, Cronocidad in Psychiatry: future challenges and therapeutic keys ”, the specialist has emphasized the challenges that arise when it comes to give a diagnosis when a patient with dementia, and it has already been diagnosed.

Dementia is a progressive loss of cognitive functions causing inability to carry out activities of daily living. Cognitive deficits can affect any brain functions like memory, language, or executive functions such as the resolution of problems.

Firstly, Medrano has indicated that a good portion of patients arriving with dementia in a mental health center are wrongly diagnosed depression or any other purely psychiatric condition ” and has been proposed as a solution that psychiatric devices should enable to correctly diagnose the disease ”.

On the other hand, the specialist said that there is a challenge for the communication of the families and the own patient diagnosis ”, by what has insisted that must be getting in the way of communicating it or in the decision do not ”.

Thirdly, according to Medrano, is the challenge of the psychiatric approach ”. There are many psychological symptoms and behavioural which constitute the bulk of the intervention of psychiatric devices in dementia. The current use of Pharmacology as the axis of the therapeutic interventions implies that psychoactive drugs will be added to medicamentosa pattern you are already taking the patient. Thus arises the possibility of generating harmful interactions for the patient.

Medrano has regretted, moreover, that the funding is available for this type of pathologies because dementia is a disease of growing to measure incidence and prevalence that is aging population and increases in life expectancy. There are currently insufficient coverage for the needs of patients and families ”.

Depression, an origin of dementia

Depression is a disorder of the State of mind that can lead to suffer a dementia on several occasions. The psychiatrist Paul Malo, for its part, also during Symposium I: life cycle, evolution and Grave Mental disorder, has dealt with depressive disorders.

According to the expert, humans lives with an innate optimism that makes you move away from the depression and, consequently, other pathologies ”. However, Medrano has indicated that not always cannot be optimistic ”.

When we fail when we fail, when something goes wrong, when we are caught up, we have to stop to reflect, to find a way out and in those moments we want to be realistic and not see rosy life. At that time suffered a response or reaction of the body which corresponds to what we call depression, which can result in other pathologies ”, pointed out.

July San Juan, Professor holder of Psychiatry University of Valencia, has affected that according to the theory of evolution the persistence of a specific feature depends on its ability to enhance survival and the ability of the individual reproductive ”.

Following this principle genes that predispose to mental illness since his desadaptativo character should disappear by natural selection. The persistence of the same process is one of the most important challenges facing at the moment research in psychiatric genetics ”, has been completed.