PH: 03 5881 3386

Is Post Operative Cognitive Dysfunction (POCD) A Possible Cause Of Dementia?

Post Operative Cognitive Dysfunction (POCD) is a term that many people have not heard about before. It is Memory Loss after Anesthetics and is a common adverse event after surgery. The incidence of this condition is much higher than one would have thought and it appears to affect people over the age of 60 years and upwards.

Here are some statistics for you to think about :-

“The incidence of POCD in the first week after surgery is 23% in patients between 60 and 69 years of age and 29% in patients older than 70 years of age.

Cognitive dysfunction was still present in 14% of patients over 70 years of age at three months after surgery.”

Even more statistics for Australia that are very interesting:-
“One third or about 264,000 of the 800,000 Australians over 65 years having operations each year are showing cognitive deficits one week after surgery. And about one in five or 160,000 over the age of 65 years are still suffering mentally three months on”.

Post Operative Cognitive Dysfunction is a subject that I feel strongly about. My mother many years ago, had a fall and broke her hip and had to have hip surgery. We waited anxiously to see mum and hoped that the operation was a success. When we saw her, she looked over at Dad and smiled. Then she looked at me with a puzzled expression – didn’t she know me? I was shocked. We asked the doctor what’s going on – and he explained that this was quite a normal thing to happen and it was only temporary. He said that mum would be back to her normal self whenever the anaesthetic wore off. So we waited, days, weeks, months …. It never happened – mum never came back to her normal self again. Her hip surgery with anaesthetics had brought on Alzheimer’s disease/dementia.

So this was one of the reasons I started researching all I could about Alzheimer’s disease and why this had happened to my mother. It is now 17 years ago since she passed away, and yet still, I believe that Post Operative Cognitive Dysfunction resulting from hip surgery with the use of Anaesthetics caused her to get Alzheimer's disease.

 

WIN A COPY OF

'SMART BRAIN HEALTHY BRAIN'

EVERY WEEK I am going to give away a copy of my International Award-winning book 'SMART BRAIN HEALTHY BRAIN'. All you need to do to go into the Draw is put your details in the box below. If you win, it will appear in your mailbox. It's that simple!