Had the author used less 'jargon & acronyms', this might have been a more user friendly item. The title suugests I might have been an intended reader but the language does not.

This article is just one big advertisement for a product that is supposed to build your 'brain power'.

Click on any of the accompanying adverts that ask you to test your brain power, and naturally you won't fair too well.

You will then consider giving the 'free trial' a go, and maybe believe your brain power is improving, and go on to pay the big dollars for the rest of the 'course'.

I don't think this article is really suitable for this forum.
Don't fall for it.

The manifest of mental illness associated with ageing is daunting. One wonders what the view through the eye of the psychiatrist looking back at the patient. What thoughts confront him as he eyeballs another vacant stare ripe for the diagnosis from the arms-length index of mental failure.

To confront another need to assess the accumulation of lost mental faculties sacrificed to ages of worry, another tormented mind warped but habitually soothed through years of alcohol and recreational drug imbibments sanctioned by the drug culture of the surfing sixties, the old school crutches soon to be exchanged for modern day psychotropics, chemically engineered to guide the “missile” of the mind to its final landing pad, the coffin.

Go for it “Doc”

Frankly I'm surprised that this article was allowed to be published on this forum. I would have thought that this subject should be handled by an appropriate specialist after a referral from one's GP. Generalisations and sweeping statements should not be made especially from an author who is involved with the Australian Medical Association. I'm not sure what the point of this article was - but it certainly was not very helpful at all - in fact I found it somewhat misleading. People should not be encouraged to undertake any sort of test, unless they are a specialist in the field. The advice should be, if you're at all concerned get a referral to a specialist from your GP. And even a specialist can make mistakes.

I think the Author needs to be examined by someone that has been diagnosed sane, and not to trust your own diagnosis.

Actually, I found Phillip Norris' article valid and helpful. I wish my family had had access to such a short but comprehensive article over three years ago.

A male relative has been diagnosed with frontal lobe dementia. Things were going obviously awry four years ago, if not longer. His GP put him through the battery of physical tests described by Dr Norris, with subsequent referral to a specialist. The diagnosis was determined last mid-year. This has taken an innordinate length of time.

I understand that there is no medical 'assistance' for frontal lobe dementia, but in other forms of dementia, such as alzheimers, there is some help. Given the length of time to come to a diagnosis with my relative, if he had had a different type of dementia - a type more amenable to some form of treatment (albeit no cure) - he would have been well past any form of assistance by the time he was diagnosed.

With the predicted coming 'epidemic' of dementia with an ageing population, it is important that the public is informed. For many this will mean being proactive in seeking help if one has a problem, with an understanding of screening process. Many do not want to know, which is to a degree understandable. On the other hand, some who fear they may have incipient dementia, may find that they do not, but have an easily treated condition. There are also those who want to know what is ahead of them in order to make arrangements beforehand, so as to relieve the family of such decisions.