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Turkish Journal of Medical Sciences

Author ORCID Identifier

MERVE GÜNER: 0000-0002-7417-5415

MELTEM KOCA: 0000-0003-3013-8556

SERDAR CEYLAN: 0000-0001-5885-4023

ARZU OKYAR BAŞ: 0000-0002-1518-5939

AYŞE DİKMEER: 0000-0003-3016-8173

MERT EŞME: 0000-0003-3617-2077

OSMAN ÇELİK: 0000-0003-2131-2866

MUSTAFA AYVALI: 0000-0002-0116-5152

MURAT ÇAĞLAYAN: 0000-0003-3486-6067

MUSTAFA ÜLGÜ: 0000-0003-0825-1851

GÜLNİHAL ÜNAL: 0000-0002-2927-6460

CAFER BALCI: 0000-0002-1478-1106

NAİM ATA: 0000-0001-6947-2821

MUSTAFA CANKURTARAN: 0000-0002-8213-7515

BURCU DOĞU: 0000-0002-4430-6146

ŞUAYİP BİRİNCİ: 0000-0001-8104-6198

DOI

10.55730/1300-0144.5833

Abstract

Background/aim: Türkiye is a country with an increasing life expectancy and an older adult population in parallel with the rest of the world. Several national small-scale studies were performed regarding the prevalence and characteristics of dementia in Türkiye, and the results of these studies differ from each other. We aimed to determine the prevalence of dementia in Türkiye to present the demographic characteristics, the frequency of use of health services, and the management of dementia.Materials and methods: Patients aged 65 years and over with a diagnosis of any type of dementia between January 1, 2019, and December 31, 2020, were retrospectively screened from the electronic health records of the Ministry of Health using ICD-10 codes.Results: In 2019, the total number of dementia cases identified in individuals aged 65 years and older was 247,727, of whom 150,529 (60.8%) were women. In 2020, the total number of dementia cases identified in this age group was 233,949, with 142,878 (61.1%) of these cases being women. The rate of patients admitted to the emergency department was 72.3% and 66.2% of all dementia patients in 2019 and 2020, respectively. In terms of the use of outpatient clinics, most patients with dementia were admitted to neurology (71.0% in 2019 and 62.4% in 2020). The geriatric medicine outpatient clinic was the least used by patients with dementia both in 2019 and 2020.Conclusion: The prevalence of patients living with dementia in Türkiye is lower than the global average. This suggests that most dementia cases are overlooked, highlighting the need to raise dementia awareness both in the community and among primary health care providers who frequently encounter older individuals. The study is significant in that it is the first to show the nationwide frequency of dementia in Türkiye.

Keywords

Dementia, geriatrics, prevalence

First Page

644

Last Page

651

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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