Dementia in Nepal and its problems

<p>Anil Pokharel</p>

Dementia in Nepal and its problems

Anil Pokharel

Alzheimer center, Lithuania

: Int J Ment Health Psychiatry

Abstract

With increase in income, access to medical facilities, access to nutritious food the life expectancy of the poor and developing countries is increasing. Thus with the increase in the life expectancy rates in those countries the chronic and progressive neurodegenerative disease like dementia is also expected to increase. Dementia which seems to be the major challenge in the developed countries is going to be the chronic challenge for the developing countries in the coming time. Increase in the environmental pollution, chemical fertilizers rich food, lack of far sighting program, plans to cope with this disease; lack of enough financial funds for research in this sector can help to make dementia a chronic epidemic disease in such countries. Nepal is a small country in the south Asia with 30 million populations and the number of elderly population is increasing day by day. The population of the older people was 1.7 million in 2001 and it jumped to 2.7 million in 2011. Thus it shows that Nepal is in high risk of dementia with the increase in older population. Thus effective program, policies and plans have to be formulated and applied from today to cope with it.