What is dementia?

Hi - Great question!

This is a useful feature about the 'difference' between dementia & Alzheimer's.

Here's another on the stages of Alzheimer's as it relates to caregiving guidelines.

To answer your question directly, stage 4 refers to moderate decline (mild or early stage). The Alzheimer's society provide a useful list of all the stages.

Hope this helps

Christine

I found this (somewhere on the web) to be informative for anyone else dealing with dementia caretaking.

Stage one: normal adult with no functional decline.
Stage two: age associated memory impairment with personal awareness of some functional decline. Stage three: mild cognitive impairment with noticeable deficits in demanding job situations.
Stage four: mild dementia with requiring assistance in complicated tasks.
Stage five: moderate dementia with requiring assistance in choosing proper attire.
Stage six: moderately severe dementia with requiring assistance dressing, bathing and toileting.
Stage seven: severe dementia with speech ability declines to about half dozens intelligible words.

I feel my mother in law is 64 and is already somewhere in between stage 4 and 5.
Her PET Scan did confirm frontal lobe shrinkage.