Caring for a loved one with Alzheimer's Disease or dementia can sometimes feel like a long, lonely journey, and often, the needs of the caregiver are overlooked or ignored. This book will help you understand what's happening with your loved one, but it will also provide guidance on how to sustain your relationship, your own emotional well-being, and some of the other management issues that you will face during these challenging times.


Caregiving for a loved one with Alzheimer's disease or dementia is hard. It's hard whether you're caring for your spouse, parent, grandparent, sibling, other family member, or friend. Even if you had an extra ten hours each day to do it, it's hard to manage all the problems that come with dementia. And caring for a loved one with dementia can sometimes feel like a long, lonely journey.

Six Steps to Managing Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia can help, addressing concerns such as:
? Is the problem Alzheimer's, dementia, or something else?
? How do you approach problems in dementia?
? How do you manage problems with memory, language, and vision?
? How do you cope with emotional and behavioral problems?
? What are the best ways to manage troubles with sleep and incontinence?
? Which medications can help?
? Which medications can actually make things worse?
? How do you build your care team?
? Why is it important to care for yourself?
? How do you sustain your relationship with your loved one?
? How do you plan for the progression of dementia?
? How do you plan for the end and beyond?

Six Steps to Managing Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia is comprehensive yet written in an easy-to-read style, featuring clinical vignettes and character-based stories that provide real-life examples of how to successfully manage Alzheimer's disease and dementia.

Andrew E. Budson
Chief, Cognitive & Behavioral Neurology and Associate Chief of Staff for Education, VA Boston Healthcare System
Associate Director & Education Core Leader, Boston University Alzheimer's Disease Center
Professor of Neurology, Boston University School of Medicine
Lecturer in Neurology, Harvard Medical School

Maureen K. O'Connor
Edith Nourse Rogers Memorial Veterans Affairs Medical Center
Department of Psychology

Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction

Step 1 Understand dementia
1 What is dementia?
2 What is Alzheimer's disease?
3 Which other disorders cause dementia?

Step 2 Manage problems
4 How to approach problems in dementia
5 How to manage memory problems
6 How to manage language problems
7 How to manage vision problems
8 How to manage emotional problems
9 How to manage behavioral problems
10 How to manage sleep problems
11 How to manage problems with bodily functions

Step 3 Ask about medications
12 Which medications can worsen thinking, memory, behavior, or function?
13 Which medications can improve thinking, memory, behavior, or function?

Step 4 Build your care team
14 Why and how should you care for yourself?
15 How do you build your care team?

Step 5 Sustain your relationship
16 Why is it important to sustain your relationship?
17 What are some ways to sustain your relationship?

Step 6 Plan for the future
18 How to plan for the progression of dementia
19 How to plan for the end and beyond

Glossary (with additional disorders and neuroanatomy)
Further resources
About the authors
Index