ABSTRACT
References 163
Dementia is one of the main causes of disability in later life. In terms of the global burden of disease, it contributes 11.2 per cent of all years lived with disability; higher than stroke (9.5 per cent), musculoskeletal disorders (8.9 per cent), heart disease (5 per cent) and cancer (2.4 per cent) (World Health Organization, 2003). Nevertheless, in comparison to other areas of long-term disease management, dementia care currently constitutes only a small proportion of a primary care family doctor’s workload, with only one or two new cases a year per primary care doctor in a demographically average population. While family doctors may have few cases, their engagement with those patients and their families is likely to be over years, as the median length of time from diagnosis to death is 10 years for those under 65 at diagnosis and four years for those over 80 years (Xie et al., 2008). As populations rapidly age, this situation will change. Health care systems in many countries are anticipating the need to develop new services and reconfigure existing ones to respond to the increasing prevalence of dementia.
