Practices and opinions about disclosure of the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease to patients with MCI or dementia : a survey among Belgian medical experts in the field of dementia

Abstract: Previous surveys revealed that only a minority of clinicians routinely disclosed the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) to their patients. Many health professionals fear that the disclosure could be harmful to the patient. Recent advances in the development of biomarkers and new diagnostic criteria allow for an earlier diagnosis of AD at the mild cognitive impairment (MCI) stage. The Belgian Dementia Council, a group of Belgian experts in the field of dementia, performed a survey among its 44 members about their opinions and practices regarding disclosure of the diagnosis of AD, i... Mehr ...

Verfasser: Mormont, Eric
Bier, Jean-Christophe
Bruffaerts, Rose
Cras, Patrick
De Deyn, Peter Paul
Deryck, Olivier
Engelborghs, Sebastiaan
Petrovic, Mirko
Picard, Gaëtane
Segers, Kurt
Thiery, Evert
Versijpt, Jan
Hanseeuw, Bernard
Picard, Gaetane
Dokumenttyp: Artikel
Erscheinungsdatum: 2020
Schlagwörter: Human medicine
Sprache: Englisch
Permalink: https://search.fid-benelux.de/Record/base-28877237
Datenquelle: BASE; Originalkatalog
Powered By: BASE
Link(s) : https://hdl.handle.net/10067/1704450151162165141

Abstract: Previous surveys revealed that only a minority of clinicians routinely disclosed the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) to their patients. Many health professionals fear that the disclosure could be harmful to the patient. Recent advances in the development of biomarkers and new diagnostic criteria allow for an earlier diagnosis of AD at the mild cognitive impairment (MCI) stage. The Belgian Dementia Council, a group of Belgian experts in the field of dementia, performed a survey among its 44 members about their opinions and practices regarding disclosure of the diagnosis of AD, including MCI due to AD, and its consequences. Twenty-six respondents declared that they often or always disclose the diagnosis of AD to patients with dementia and to patients with MCI when AD CSF biomarkers are abnormal. The majority observed that the disclosure of AD is rarely or never harmful to the patients. Their patients and their caregivers rarely or never demonstrated animosity towards the clinicians following disclosure of the diagnosis of AD. These results should reassure clinicians about the safety of AD diagnosis disclosure in most cases whether the patient is at the MCI or the dementia stage.