@article{ref1,
title="The course of neuropsychiatric symptoms in community-dwelling patients with dementia: a systematic review",
journal="International psychogeriatrics / IPA",
year="2014",
author="Borsje, Petra and Wetzels, Roland B. and Lucassen, Peter L. and Pot, Anne Margriet and Koopmans, Raymond T.",
volume="27",
number="3",
pages="385-405",
abstract="BACKGROUND: Neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) often occur in patients with dementia. Understanding the course of NPS in dementia is important for healthcare professionals for psycho-educational purposes and adequate and timely interventions to prevent or diminish NPS as much as possible. <br><br>METHODS: We conducted a systematic literature search in several electronic databases. We combined search strings for the terms dementia, community-dwelling, cohort studies and NPS. Screening titles and abstracts, assessing the methodological quality and data-extraction were independently conducted by at least two authors. <br><br>RESULTS: This literature search revealed 6605 unique records of which 23 studies were included in data synthesis. In total 7184 patients participated in the included studies with a mean number of 312. Sixty percent of the participants were female and the mean age of all participants was 74.8 years. Follow-up varied between 1 and 6 years; in 17 studies loss to follow-up was less than 20% per year. NPS are highly prevalent, incident and persistent although frequency parameters vary considerably across studies. Delusions/delusional misidentification, wandering/agitation, aberrant motor behavior/motor hyperactivity and apathy are the most common NPS. For hallucinations, delusions/delusional misidentification, paranoia, aggression, wandering/agitation, aberrant motor behavior/motor hyperactivity, disinhibition, apathy, and sleep disturbance increasing trends in point prevalence rates have been found. <br><br>CONCLUSIONS: NPS in community-dwelling patients are frequent and persistent. The increasing trends of several NPS in the course of dementia require a preventive approach of professional caretakers. For such an approach, a timely diagnosis and adequate professional support to prevent or diminish these problems is necessary.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="1041-6102",
doi="10.1017/S1041610214002282",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S1041610214002282"
}