Page 314 - merged

S072-1

Disorders of Appetite, Eating and Swallowing in the Dementias Part.1

Manabu Ikeda

Kumamoto University, Japan

Background/Objective: It is well known that eating problems occur in association with cognitive
dysfunction, psychiatric problems, and decline of daily activity in individuals with dementia（Holm
et al., 2003; Correia Sde M et al, 2010）. By contrast to the wealth of information on advanced
dementia relatively few studies have addressed the eating problems in mild dementia and
disease-specific behaviors. In this paper, I will review the unique characteristics of swallowing
dysfunction and eating behavior for various dementia syndromes.

Method: To understand eating / swallowing problems in neurodegenerative disorders such as
Alzheimer’s disease (AD), dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), and frontotemporal dementia (FTD),
previous studies including our reports were reviewed.

Result: Eating problems have been shown to be mild and infrequent in early stage AD patients,
although eating and swallowing impairments are well documented in late-stage AD. DLB patients
showed significantly higher scores than AD patients for “difficulty in swallowing foods”, “coughing
or choking when swallowing”, “taking a long time to swallow”, ”suffering from sputum”, “loss of
appetite”. Change in eating behaviors such as appetite increase, change in food preference, altered
eating habits, and other oral behaviors were significantly more common in FTD than in AD.

Conclusion: Recent studies highlight the importance of careful observation and assessment of eating
behaviors of dementia taking a disease and stage specific viewpoint. I will discuss the neural
substrates of these disease specific eating behaviors and interventions for these behaviors in
Kumamoto dementia care model.