Enhancing utility of neuropsychological evaluation for earlier and effective diagnosis of dementia in Parkinson’s disease (PDCogniCare)

Neurological diseases, including Parkinson’s disease create the single largest increase in the social and economic impact in Australia, and this is expected to grow with the ageing population. Dementia is observed in 80% of people living with advanced stage Parkinson’s disease; however, there are inadequate opportunities for early and effective diagnosis of dementia in current clinical practice.

Our goal is to develop and implement a new technology-assisted intervention, PDCogniCare, for early and improved diagnosis of dementia in people living with Parkinson’s disease.

Aims

There are 3 main parts of our research project:

Study 1 -  Guidelines development study: Develop and implement best practice guidelines for cognitive evaluation in Parkinson’s disease for an improved diagnosis of dementia and mild cognitive impairment.

Study 2 - Digital platform study: Co-design, develop and test a digital platform that enables clinicians to track routine cognitive assessments according to guidelines over the course of PD for earlier diagnosis of dementia, and identification of patients at high-risk of developing dementia.

Study 3 - Implementation study: Examine the feasibility, effectiveness, and implementation of PDCogniCare in two hospitals. In-built process evaluation will examine implementation within Parkinson’s disease clinical care, psychological services, and psychological training.

Status

Recruitment for Study 3 (Implementation study) is currently underway.