A 12-year comparison of patients with Alzheimer’s dementia with their informants in eight Asian countries

Background

The number of patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) has increased dramatically in Asia.

Objective

To update the demographic characteristics of patients with AD and their informants in eight Asian countries and compare them from 12 years prior.

Methods

The A1–A3 components of the Uniform Dataset (UDS), version 3.0, were administered in Taiwan, Beijing, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan, Philippines, Thailand, and Indonesia. Data were compared with patients with AD in the first registration using the UDS version 1.0 from 2010–2014 in the same regions.

Results

A total of 1885 patients with AD and their informants were recruited from 2022 to 2024 and were compared with 2042 patients recruited a decade prior. Each country had its own unique characteristics that changed between both eras. The mean age of the patients and informants was 79.8±8.2 years and 56.5±12.1 years, respectively. Compared with the first registration, the patients were older (79.8 vs 79.0, p=0.002) and had worse global function (mean CDR-SB scores 6.1 vs 5.8, p<0.001); more informants were children (56 % vs. 48 %, p<0.001), and their frequency of in-person visits increased significantly if not living together. A total of 11 %, 4.5 %, 11 %, and 0.4 % of the patients had a reported history of cognitive impairment in their mothers, fathers, siblings, and children, respectively; all percentages, except children, increased significantly over the past decade.

Conclusion

The present study reports the heterogeneous characteristics of patients with AD and their informants in Asian countries, and the distinct changes in the past decade. The differences in dementia evaluation and care between developing and developed countries warrant further investigation.