Risk score developed from routinely collected data by primary healthcare practitioners is useful to rule out dementia in 60-79 year-olds.

Abstract

Commentary on: Walters K, Hardoon S, Petersen I, et al. Predicting dementia risk in primary care: development and validation of the Dementia Risk Score using routinely collected data. BMC Medicine 2016;14:6[OpenUrl][1][CrossRef][2][PubMed][3]. In spite of major repercussions on the life of patients and caregivers, dementia remains a neglected domain in primary care setting. Previous studies have shown that only a third of new dementia cases occurring in the general population were referred to a specialist1 and that too at a severe stage of the disease, 25% of cases were ignored.2 A great proportion of primary care practitioners (PCPs) consider dementia to be an irreversible consequence of brain ageing. However, PCPs are pragmatic, and if a simple predicting score based on … [1]: {openurl}?query=rft.jtitle%253DBMC%2BMedicine%26rft.volume%253D14%26rft.spage%253D6%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Adoi%252F10.1186%252Fs12916-016-0549-y%26rft_id%253Dinfo%253Apmid%252F26797096%26rft.genre%253Darticle%26rft_val_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Ajournal%26ctx_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ver%253DZ39.88-2004%26url_ctx_fmt%253Dinfo%253Aofi%252Ffmt%253Akev%253Amtx%253Actx [2]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=10.1186/s12916-016-0549-y&link_type=DOI [3]: /lookup/external-ref?access_num=26797096&link_type=MED&atom=%2Febmed%2F21%2F5%2F198.atom