When Eating Problems Arise in Advanced Dementia: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Communicating with Caregivers (TH301)

With the aging population of the United States, dementia is becoming a national healthcare problem. Geriatricians and palliative care providers will be unable to provide care to the rapidly growing number of patients with advanced dementia; therefore it becomes imperative to train as many healthcare providers and interdisciplinary team members as possible about the course of the dementia and nature of the complications in the advanced stages of the disease. Advanced dementia is often not recognized by healthcare providers as a terminal disease. This lack of knowledge is cited as the major barrier in developing plans of care