Assessing speech and communication impairments in cognitive disorders: an innovative development in a memory clinic

摘要

Although there is a great emphasis on memory in the diagnosis of dementia and in the measurement of treatment response, disorders of language are an important, but sometimes neglected, feature of many dementias. In 2005 the Academic Unit for the Psychiatry of Old Age of the University of Melbourne was located at St. George's Hospital in the inner eastern suburbs of Melbourne, Australia. In association with the Unit's Memory and Related Disorders Clinic (MRDC), the Inner East Community Health Service (IECHS) established a Speech and Communication Clinic (SCC). The purpose of the collaboration was to provide an innovative service to the older members of the community.