|  This new addition to the ‘Best medicine’ series aims
to give health professionals, patients, families and carers access to
good
quality, independent information about Alzheimer’s disease. It
begins with a synopsis of the disease covering the symptoms and diagnosis
and a critique of currently available treatments.
The middle section consists of detailed drug reviews. These are thorough
and technical, written originally for health professionals and published
independently in a peer-reviewed publication Drugs in Context. The text
covers the major drugs used to treat Alzheimer’s disease. The pharmacology
of each drug is followed by an independent evaluation of its performance
in clinical
trials and safety in clinical practice.
The final section is written for people who need to care for someone
with dementia and provides practical strategies and details of support
available in the community.
This is a well-written and authoritative work on Alzheimer’s disease.
The drug reviews are extremely technical, making this a challenging read
for the lay-person. However, the book has an excellent glossary, which
would enable the more determined reader to gain a lot of useful, independently
reviewed information about drug treatments. The “patient notes” sections
are clear and informative, giving families or carers a good idea of what
they could expect from health services and, in particular, from the patient’s
own GP.
The publication does not offer any solutions for those people with Alzheimer’s
disease who live alone, without family or carers to provide the necessary
monitoring and support needed to gain full benefit from drug treatments.
The book is 150 pages long, paperback, well laid out and indexed, and
has clear diagrams supporting the technical text. It is excellent value
for money at £12.95.
Pam Grant
Lead medicines management pharmacist in the Woodlands Elderly Resource Team
at Alderney Community Hospital, Poole
|
The
Pharmaceutical Journal