Browsing by Subject "spesifisyys"

Although dementia is often considered a disease of the elderly, it also affects those in midlife. Diagnosing early-onset dementias is challenging, since their central traits differ from those usually seen in the more common late-onset dementias, and the diversity of different dementia profiles is high. Especially nonamnestic dementias, which are common among early-onset dementias, are frequently misdiagnosed or the diagnosis is significantly delayed. In Finland, CERAD is the preferred neuropsychological screening method for dementia but it doesn't have Finnish norms for the middle aged, and its ability to recognize early-onset dementias seems to be insufficient. There is a demand for a screening method aimed at recognizing the early-onset dementias, which would be more sensitive and diverse than the methods used at present. In this review, the characteristics and discriminability of the two most common early-onset dementias – the early-onset type of Alzheimer's disease and frontotemporal dementia – are examined. This review focuses especially in studies, that have examined the sensitivity and specificity of neuropsychological screening methods discriminating those two dementias. This research suggests, that ACE-III, SEB and SDS are screening methods, that could help in the accurate diagnosing of early-onset dementias.