ABSTRACT
In Alzheimer’s Disease (AD), care takes place in a large variety of contexts, from nursing homes to extended families; these contexts, and the presence of other conditions and diseases, make it difficult to achieve scientific control, or to measure costs. The problems of determining health outcomes in AD are considered by J. Busschbach et al, in respect of multi-national clinical trials. If studies were undertaken in one country, greater reliability could be achieved, though the obvious problems of using questionnaires to assess the quality of life of severely handicapped AD patients would remain. One alternative is the assessment of the quality of life of the carer, for instance in the ACQLI measure used by M. F. Drummond. Patients with AD are cared for either at home or in institutions; if the drug reduces hospital care, it must increase informal care, to achieve its cost reductions.
