The report authored by Joshua Armstrong, a researcher with the Thunder Bay-based Alzheimer’s Society, says that by the year 2050 more than 1.7 million Canadians will be living with dementia, nearly triple the current number. On average almost 700 people will be diagnosed each day. The report states that more than one million people will serve as care partners for a total of more than 1.4 billion hours per year. They are often taken for granted by society, he says, but the care they provide would be equivalent to nearly 700,000 full-time jobs. Armstrong, who is affiliated with the Department of Health Sciences at Lakehead University as an assistant professor, says, “For years, we’ve known these numbers were coming, but they’re starting to come a little faster now with the baby boomers heading into their 80s. and 90″. In an interview he said that there are serious implications for the health system. “There is a need for hospital care, long-term care and home care. Many people with dementia actually live at home and rely on family, friends and neighbors for support. There will be increased demands on these care partners, who on average provide approximately 26 hours of care each week.” Armstrong’s report outlines three hypothetical scenarios in which the onset of dementia was delayed by one, five or 10 years. The goal was to demonstrate the impact if Canada was able to improve prevention efforts for dementia and delay its onset across the population. All three scenarios demonstrated the power of prevention. Even a delay of just one year could result in nearly 500,000 fewer new cases by 2050. Armstrong said there is a growing list of so-called modifiable risk factors that can be addressed by individuals or health care systems, public health agencies and levels of government. Already well-researched mitigation measures include making sure you “stay on top of your blood pressure, your heart health (what’s good for the heart is good for the brain, which reduces the risk of dementia), but also making sure you’re not drinking too much alcohol, being physically active, not carrying too much weight, seeking treatment if you’re depressed and not smoking,” he said. Although no cure or effective treatment for dementia has yet been discovered, the report describes a number of actions that can lead to more positive outcomes for patients and their families. He suggests that health care systems provide primary care physicians with better education about early detection of dementia symptoms, diagnosis, and especially ongoing. Clinicians, the report says, also require better access to diagnostic tools, education about risk-reduction approaches, and changes in fee structure so that they have sufficient time and pay to provide support to patients and their care partners. Among many other measures, it recommends that the federal government spend and fully fund a national dementia strategy and increase its investment in research, and that provincial governments create new dementia-friendly community care and long-term care spaces. In an introduction to the report, Dr. Brian Goldman describes dementia as arguably the greatest health challenge facing Canada’s aging society. He says the study seeks to fill a data gap, because what’s even scarier is not knowing the scale of the challenge and its impact on the country. The Alzheimer Society will publish two more reports in the coming months. The next report will provide details of people who will develop dementia over the next three decades, including gender differences, expected population changes in the ethnicity of people living with dementia and young-onset dementia. In the final report, a simulation model will be used to examine the economic impact of dementia in Canada.
