Book Review: Developmental Disability and Ageing
Book Review: Developmental Disability and Ageing Edited by Gregory O’Brien and Lewis Rosenbloom London : Mac Keith Press , 2009 £20.00 (Paperback ), 131 pages ISBN 978-1-898683-61-2
A book on ageing for people with developmental disability has been long awaited.
This book, edited by Professor Gregory O’Brien and Dr Lewis Rosenbloom, has addressed some of the unexplored areas of the ageing process in people with developmental disability. The emphasis is on helping the clinician to achieve a better understanding of the ageing process. The book gives clear practical suggestions on clinical practice with case examples and descriptions of the current evidence-base.
The well-written chapters cover a range of clinical topics in relation to the ageing process and developmental disorder, dementia, Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and other genetic conditions. Chapters are also devoted to drug treatment of common problems and living with ageing and developmental disorder.
Chapter 1 provides an excellent overview of the ageing process in people with developmental disability. The second chapter concentrates on dementia (with case vignettes) and highlights difficulties in the assessment process owing to changing needs. Particular emphasis has been placed on the area of differential diagnosis and the challenges clinicians face in working through this range of possibilities.
Chapter 3 highlights the physical and cognitive changes in people with Down syndrome. I was particularly impressed with the efforts made to separate issues related to ageing in Down syndrome from those of dementia.
The issue of ageing in people with cerebral palsy, is discussed in Chapter 4. The impact on physical health and cognition is highlighted, along with neuromuscular and orthopaedic changes. The main attraction of this chapter is the description of intervention opportunities, with practical suggestions for everyday care as well as specific interventions useful for problems encountered.
Chapter 5 is devoted to the process of ageing in people with developmental disorders other than Down syndrome. This chapter attempts to bring valuable information from many areas together in one section and classifies the syndromes as progressive and non-progressive disorders. The focus of this chapter is on how the ageing process influences a person’s behaviour and functioning over time.
The next chapter is devoted to general guidelines on the use of drugs in the ageing population, with a focus on the use of anti-dementia medication, whilst the last chapter concentrates on living with ageing with special emphasis on co-ordinated care and intervention. There is guidance on working with carers, improving general health, use of psychosocial interventions, and environmental considerations. This chapter provides good case examples and emphasis has been given to combining approaches that are generally used for older people and those with developmental disability.
Overall, I feel that this book is extremely useful to the clinician involved in providing care for the older population with developmental disabilities.
