| CDC defines dementia: > Dementia is not a specific disease but is rather a general term for the impaired ability to remember, think, or make decisions that interferes with doing everyday activities. Article says: > Long before people develop dementia, they often begin falling behind on mortgage payments, credit card bills and other financial obligations, new research shows. > Credit scores among people who later develop dementia..... Author is conflating the diagnosis of dementia with the development of dementia. It is not like a person wakes up one day with dementia. It progresses slowly. Early stage dementia is still dementia. I don't know what the formal requirements for diagnosis are but my guess is that that has to be a significant quality of life degradation for it to be diagnosed (or even for someone to be taken to see a doctor for that matter). > New research shows that people who develop dementia often begin falling behind on bills years earlier. I would say something like "New research shows that people in early stages of dementia often begin falling behind on bills years before it can be diagnosed." |
The study quantitatively evaluates some of the costs of a political choice to limit medicine to treating only a decline well bellow the average (instead of the individual's peak) and bellow the ability to perform self care as a disease.