1.1 Dementia syndrome is caused by a lot of different symptoms such as, death of nerve cells or communication between nerve cells, failure to recognise people such as your children and relatives, and decline in mental function.
1.2 Memory impairment examples which are commonly related to dementia syndrome are, a decline in memory function results in the loss of memories from recent events, forgetting how to do familiar things such as cooking a meal they usually cook and forgetting how to play a game they are familiar with. Communication may be affected as the individual may repeat themselves and ask the same questions repeatedly.
1.3 Individuals who have dementia have problems when processing information due to the brain incorrectly processing the information which in turn can result in problems with communication, this can cause feelings of fear and frustration. Visual problems due to the brain rather than the eyes could be; visual acuity, contrast sensitivity, colour vision and depth perception. Hallucinations and delusions can be another issue in relation to cognitive impairment from vascular dementia. Alzheimer’s disease can cause problems recalling recent events. Pick disease can cause problems with sight and hearing and can also be distracted easily due to limited attention span. Dementia with Lewy bodies can have spatial disorientation, hallucinations of animals and people and can be extremely confused.
Other factors can cause changes in an individual’s condition which may not be caused by dementia can be mistaken for dementia because they both have similarities on a person’s behaviour and communication. Medication can cause effects on an individual such as; memory loss and sleepiness. Delirium causes changes in the mental function which can be mistaken for dementia due to the close similarities to dementia, delirium’s onset can be very rapid over days and weeks rather than dementia which develops over months. Depression can also show similarities to dementia as the individual can become withdrawn, mood swings, agitation and withdraw from society. Medications such as; sedatives, anti-anxiety medications, antihistamines and antidepressants can cause dementia like symptoms