Do community-dwelling Māori and Pacific peoples present with dementia at a younger age and at a later stage compared with NZ Europeans?

Objective: Ethnicity may affect presentation to clinical services in people with dementia; however, no studies have examined this in Māori or Pacific peoples in New Zealand (NZ). Our objective was to examine the routinely collected clinical data from a memory assessment service in South Auckland to examine the presentation of dementia in the major NZ ethnic groups.

Methods: A total of 360 patients presenting to a memory service with a new diagnosis of dementia were included in this study.

Early onset dementia in New Zealand Pacific boxers: a case series.

Aim: To describe the biopsychosocial characteristics of a series of Pacific men living in South Auckland with a history of boxing presenting with early onset dementia. We discuss the history of boxing in Pacific people and the possibility of increased risk of early onset dementia in New Zealand Pacific men compared to their European counterparts.

Method: We reviewed the files of Pacific men with a history of amateur or professional boxing who presented to our memory and older adult mental health services with early onset dementia over a 45-month period.

Do clinicians assess patients' religiousness? An audit of an aged psychiatry community team.

Objectives: To determine the frequency and quality of religious history taking of patients by clinicians working in an old age psychiatry service.

Methods: A retrospective audit of 80 randomised patient files from the Koropiko Mental Health Services for Older People (MHSOP) in Middlemore Hospital, Auckland, New Zealand.

Results: A total of 66 clinical records were available for analysis.

The importance of taking a religious and spiritual history.

Objective: The objective of this study was to explain the reasons for taking a religious and spiritual history, which is often neglected by psychiatrists, and to introduce some religious and spiritual assessment tools to assist those psychiatrists who feel inexperienced in this area.

Conclusion: Religious and spiritual assessment enhances quality of patient care. Training programs for psychiatry registrars need to include modules on religious and spiritual assessment of patients.

Falling for her psychiatrist: an unusual cause of falls in the elderly.

We describe the case of an elderly woman with auditory hallucinations of her psychiatrist commanding her to fall. The case highlights an unusual cause of falls in the elderly, not previously described in the falls literature.

Psychotherapeutic treatments in late life.

Purpose Of Review: To assess recent research in psychotherapies for the elderly.

Recent Findings: There is preliminary evidence for the effectiveness of cognitive-behaviour therapy in panic disorder, and problem-solving therapy in depression with cognitive impairment. Significant advances have been made showing the benefits of cognitive-behaviour therapy in the medically ill.

Religiousness and recovery from inpatient geriatric depression: Findings from the PEJAMA Study.

Objective: To determine whether religiousness, in particular intrinsic religiosity, influences the prognosis of elderly inpatients with major depression, and, if so, whether this effect is related to social support.

Method: A total of 94 patients (71% women; mean age = 76) with DSM-IV major depression were assessed on admission to a psychogeriatric unit in Melbourne, and then reviewed at 6, 12 and 24 months. Depression was measured using the Geriatric Depression Rating Scale - short form, religiousness, using the five-item Duke University Religion Index, and social support using the Social Support Questionnaire.

Confabulation: a spontaneous and fantastic review.

Confabulation can be of two types: provoked or spontaneous. The former is the more common and can occur on challenge to an amnesic patient's memory. Spontaneous confabulation involves an unprovoked outpouring of unbelievable autobiographical claims.

Religiosity of depressed elderly inpatients.

Objectives: To determine the prevalence of religious practices and beliefs of depressed elderly Australian inpatients and their relationship to physical, social, and cognitive variables known to influence the prognosis of depression in the elderly. To compare the results obtained with those from similar North American studies.

Methods And Procedures: Inpatients with a DSM-IV diagnosis of major depression were interviewed on admission to the psychogeriatric unit of a Melbourne geriatric centre.