Alzheimer’s and cognitive deficit: an increasingly alarming emergency for our country that risks sending it into default within a few years. This is the picture that emerges from a survey by the Centro Studi of Senior Italia FederAnziani on the official data relating to this pathology, which is disseminated on the occasion of the World Alzheimer’s Day tomorrow 21 September. A picture that is all the more worrying in light of the progressive aging of the population that affects our country, and beyond, raising questions about the ability of our families, our social and health system to counter the phenomenon and its consequences. of our community.
Cognitive Deficit is a condition that involves the progressive impairment of cognitive functions in such a way as to jeopardize the maintenance of an independent life. The World Health Organization reports alarming growth estimates of the deficit: 35.6 million cases in 2010 which will double in 2030 and triple in 2050 with 7.7 million new cases per year (one every four seconds) and whose economic impact on health systems will be around 604 billion dollars a year, with progressive increase.
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The numbers of dementia
In Italy, the total number of patients with cognitive impairment is estimated at over one million, of which about 60%, or 600 thousand, with Alzheimer’s disease, and about three million people are directly or indirectly involved in the care of their dear with a significant impact also on the economic and organizational level (Source: Ministry of Health). The major risk factor associated with the onset of dementia is age, an aspect that in an aging society, such as ours, makes the impact of the phenomenon alarming, so much so that we can predict that these diseases will become, in times short, one of the most relevant problems in terms of public health. The prevalence of dementia in industrialized countries is about 8% in the over 65s and rises to over 20% after the age of 80. According to some projections, cases of dementia could triple in the next 30 years in Western countries. In Italy, according to demographic projections, in 2051 there will be 280 elderly people for every 100 young people, with an increase in all age-related chronic diseases, and among these dementias. Not only that: Alzheimer’s and dementias are among the causes of death in over 52,000 cases of deaths of the elderly per year (Source: ISTAT Report “Mental health in the various stages of life – Years 2015-2017”).
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And the numbers are set to increase with the progressive aging of the population. Suffice it to say that if today there are about 14 million over 65 in our country, representing about 23% of the population, in 2050 they will reach more than a third of our population (36%) reaching the quota of 19,585,000. (Source: UN – World Population Prospects 2020). Numbers that allow us to estimate an increase in patients with Alzheimer’s from the current 600,000 to over 820,000 in 2050, while the current 1 million patients with cognitive impairment will pass in 2050 to 1.3 million.
How much does Alzheimer’s cost
An emergency therefore to which our system risks being unprepared, also with respect to the economic and social impact of the phenomenon. The average annual cost per patient with Alzheimer’s overall, i.e. inclusive of costs borne by the family and the National Health Service, is estimated at € 70,587, including direct costs, or informal care – carers (16.23% of costs), access to social and health services (5.16%), other direct costs (5.60%), which account for a total of 26.80%, and indirect costs (enhancement of caregivers work, lost income) which account for 73.20 %. (Source: CENSIS and AIMA – Italian Alzheimer’s Disease Association, 2016). Costs that only a small part are borne by the NHS, weighing for the vast majority only on families, with an average annual cost borne by a family with an Alzheimer’s patient of 68,171 euros, including in this cost not only monetary expenses but also unpaid work by relatives and friends, and related lost earnings of caregivers or patients themselves.
The e-MemoryCare project
How will families and the whole system manage to withstand the impact of this emergency in the scenario of continuous aging of the population without a policy that knows how to prevent and counter its impact with timely interventions and with the right planning? The issue must be placed at the center of social and health policies. It is necessary to plan square meters of RSA that have the capacity to contain the phenomenon. We have to deal with a social structure that has changed a lot over the decades: just think that if in 1970 the average number of children per family was about 2.4, today there are only 1.2 children per family, with a real own halving. How, then, will children manage to manage the burden of the parent with cognitive impairment in the coming decades, without relying on that sharing between siblings that has largely governed the system for decades? “Precisely for this”, concludes the President of the Senior Scientific Committee Italy FederAnzianiFrancesco Fazio“Senior Italia FederAnziani sponsors, together with the entire scientific community, e-MemoryCarethe non-pharmacological method that is personalized patient by patient to favor the cognitive stimulation and possible cognitive rehabilitation of these patients “.