Self-Management of Dementia: Pathophysiology, Causes, Impact, Treatment, Health Promotion, Cultural Safety and Empowerment

Running head: COMMUNITY NURSING
COMMUNITY NURSING
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1COMMUNITY NURSING
Introduction:
Chronic diseases are considered as a form of ailment which sustains for over a period.
Most of the chronic diseases cannot be cured but could be managed with effective nursing
interventions (Mostafalou & Abdollahi, 2013). It has been found that more than half of the
global population suffer from one or more chronic illnesses (Murray & Lopez, 2013). The
purpose of the assignment is to discuss about the self management of a chronic illness. The
chosen chronic disease selected for the assignment is dementia. Dementia is defined as a
form of brain disease that leads to the reduction in the ability of thinking and remember
things for long period of time. Due to the effect of dementia a person could suffer from
memory issue, complication with language, emotional issues and distress as well. Such
condition affects the ability of a person to perform daily activities (Baumgart et al., 2015).
Such impact on the mental health of the patient has significant effect on the family and care
givers as well (Ornstein et al., 2013). Reports revealed by World Health Organization state
that more than 47.47 million people is suffering from dementia across the world and the
number is expected to reach over 75.63 million by the year 2030 (who.int, 2018). Thus, it has
become one of the major concerns of the world health system. Thus, it is important to
conduct in-depth research on dementia in order to understand the factors influence the
chronic disease to introduce adequate nursing interventions to address the factors in an
effective manner. Due to such reasons, dementia has been chosen as a subject of discussion
for the following assignment. The following paper will provide brief discussion on dementia
including Pathophysiology, causes, impact, treatment, health promotion, self-management,
cultural safety and empowerment.
Pathophysiology:

2COMMUNITY NURSING
According to Baumgart et al., (2015) dementia is not defined as the specific disease
but is explained as the combinations of group of symptoms that affect the thinking, memory,
social abilities to perform daily activities and emotional distress. However, several people
suffer from memory loss, however such a health issue tends to cause due to various reasons.
Thus memory loss alone cannot be considered as dementia (Ornstein et al., 2013). There can
be identified different causes of dementia and according to the causes the symptoms of
dementia also varies and can be reversed. Symptoms of dementia comprise both
psychological and cognitive changes whereby the most common psychological symptoms
include depression, changes in personality, anxiety, inappropriate behaviour and agitation as
well. In some cases people suffering from dementia has been found to suffer from visual and
auditory hallucinations (Baumgart et al., 2015). Paranoia is another symptom associated with
dementia that leads to the persistent and irrational feelings within a person (Freud, 2014).
Beside such psychological sufferings there are some significant cognitive changes as well. In
case of dementia, memory loss is one of the most common cognitive changes within the
patient (Baumgart et al., 2015). In addition, communicating problem, difficulty in reasoning,
confusion, disorientation, lack of concentration, problem in coordinating motor functions,
difficulties in recognizing language and understanding words have been found as the
common signs of dementia (Ornstein et al., 2013). There are some treatable medical
conditions that could help to live life meaningfully while managing dementia, thus it is
important to identify the underlying causes and consult with health professionals in case the
symptoms are identified (Chen et al., 2014).
Causes:
The main cause of dementia includes the damage of nerve cells present in the brain
and the effect of dementia varies according to the area of brain that has been affected.
Alzheimer’s disease has been considered as the most common cause of dementia (Rajan et

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al., 2015). Vascular dementia is occurred due to the damage of the blood vessels connected to
brain. Such damage in the blood vessels can be caused due to severe blood vessel conditions
or stroke as well (Barker et al., 2014). In certain cases it has been identified that some
abnormal clamps of protein leads to the consequence of lewy body dementia, one of the most
common progressive dementia (Donaghy & McKeith, 2014). Breakdown or damage of nerve
cells in the temporal or frontal lobes in the brain could lead to the consequence of dementia
(Chen et al., 2014). There are some severe disorders that could cause dementia such as,
traumatic brain injury, Parkinson’s disease, disorder due to genetic mutation and some brain
disorders (Homma et al., 2015). In addition, it has been found that symptoms of dementia can
be caused due to infections or side effects of immune disorder, medication issues, nutritional
problems, anoxia and brain tumour as well (Rullier et al., 2013). Furthermore, age such as 65
years or more, family history such as parents or other family members having dementia,
down syndrome, cognitive impairment, excessive use of alcohol, depression, smoking,
diabetes, cardiovascular risk and sleeping disorder have been found as the risk factors of
dementia (Baumgart et al., 2015).
Impact on life of individual and family:
Beside physical and psychological problems, dementia poses severe impacts on the
lives of the patient, family and the care givers as well. Both the personal and professional life
gets affected by the symptoms of dementia. Due to suffering from dementia it becomes
difficult for the patient to recognize the language and words thus they face problems in
communicating with others (Ornstein et al., 2013). Due to depression and anxiety they
become stubborn and sometimes become detached from the family and the society as well.
Due to the lack of ability to remember things and reasoning they face difficulties in
performing daily activities thus they have to depend on other family members or the care
givers for their daily activities (Kasper et al., 2015). Such realization of disability leads to