Number of dementia sufferers in Europe between the years 2000 and 2050.

Several authors have pointed out that in the next few decades dementia will affect a considerably increasing number of the elderly. To our knowledge there exist no calculations of the number of demented persons for the whole European region. We made calculations on the number of dementia cases for the period 2000-2050 based on the population projections of the United Nations. For this purpose, we used the results of several meta-analyses of epidemiological studies. The number of prevalent dementia cases in the year 2000 was 7.1 million. Within the next 50 years, this number will rise to about 16.2 million dementia sufferers. The number of new dementia cases per year will increase from about 1.9 million in the year 2000 to about 4.1 million in the year 2050. Contrarily, the working-age population will considerably decrease during the next 50 years. In the year 2000, 7.1 million dementia cases faced 493 million persons in working-age. This equals a ratio of 69.4 persons in working-age per one demented person. Until the year 2050, this ratio will decrease to only 21.1. Thus, the financial and emotional burden placed by dementia on the working-age population will markedly rise.

Heightened embarrassability discriminates between panic disorder patients with and without agoraphobia.

Embarrassability refers to an individual's general susceptibility to becoming embarrassed and is closely linked to another personality characteristic known as fear of negative evaluation. To find out if panic disorder patients with and without agoraphobia differ in terms of embarrassability and fear of negative evaluation 100 patients with a DSM-III-R diagnosis of panic disorder with agoraphobia, 30 patients with a DSM-III-R diagnosis of uncomplicated panic disorder and 80 controls were administered the Embarrassability Scale and the 12-item version of the Fear of Negative Evaluation Scale. Depressive mood in the clinical group was assessed with the help of the Beck Depression Inventory. Comparisons between these three groups, between patients with mild, moderate, and severe phobic avoidance and between male and female subjects were carried out. Patients with agoraphobic avoidance showed significantly higher scores on both scales than patients with uncomplicated panic disorder and controls and women generally showed higher embarrassability scores than men. We conclude that heightened embarrassability is an important characteristic of patients suffering from panic disorder with agoraphobia.

[Projections in the incidence of dementia in Austria for the years 1951 to 2050]. / Die Entwicklung der Demenzerkrankungen in Osterreich in den Jahren 1951 bis 2050.

Because of the increasing life expectancy it is generally assumed that the number of demented individuals will steeply rise in the next decades. Dementia is a main reason for requiring extensive nursing care. Therefore, estimations of the future number of demented subjects in Austria are necessary for planning appropriate services. Since the age structure of the Austrian population has already changed during the last decades, the development of the number of demented individuals during the last five decades is compared with the estimations for the next five decades. These estimations are based on the population projections for Austria and on all available international meta-analyses of prevalence and incidence surveys. Estimations of the number of people suffering from dementia and of those developing dementia within one year are presented for the period between 1951 and 2050. In 1951, the number of dementia sufferers was 35,500; by 2050 this number will increase to 233,800. At present, 90,500 elderly people with dementia live in Austria. Thus, in the next decades, the number of people suffering from dementia will rise more steeply than the in the past. If the projected life expectancy leads to a prolonged duration of illness the number of dementia sufferers will be markedly higher. On the other hand, the working force will decrease in the next decades. Therefore, while in 1951 there were 120 employable persons per demented person, in 2050 there will be only 17 employable persons per demented person. Extensive planning of the future care of demented people is an urgent necessity.