During the past 30 years, the growth of geriatric psychiatry services has been dramatic. Indeed, in this issue of International Psychogeriatrics, Reifler and Cohen report that most developed countries can boast of an impressive range of clinical services that include a variety of hospital-based, community-based, and long-term-care programs.

The authors conducted a survey of members of the International Psychogeriatric Association (IPA) to determine the state of development of both the profession of geriatric psychiatry and services for mentally ill elderly. Ratings for both issues were based on a scale of 1 to 4, with 1 being little to no development and 4 being the highest. A rating of 2 was set as the desired minimum, and 12 countries met this goal in both categories, with 6 more countries reaching this goal in service development only. We conclude that although the field of geriatric psychiatry and services for mentally ill elderly are still underdeveloped in much of the world, in many countries they are developed sufficiently enough that the IPA is in an excellent position to provide both information and technical assistance to nations wishing to advance.

Lack of early childhood education has been implicated as a risk factor for dementia in late life. It is unclear whether dementia risk is also associated with less education in the adult years. The purpose of the present study was to determine whether amount of postsecondary education (i.e., education beyond the high school or 12th-grade level) is associated with dementia after age 60. Cognitive function (assessed by a neuropsychological test battery) and the prevalence of dementia (assessed by clinical criteria) were determined in 86 Jesuit priests (age 60 to 98) who had from 0 to 23 years of postsecondary education. Logistic regression was used to estimate the odds of dementia as a function of postsecondary education. The risk of dementia was increased in those with less postsecondary education (odds ratio = 3.4; 95% confidence interval, 1.2 to 10.0) after adjustment for age, IQ, and depression. These findings support an association between amount of postsecondary education and risk of dementia in late life.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether premorbid personality traits predispose to noncognitive symptoms in Alzheimer's disease (AD). The Munich Personality Test was used to evaluate caregivers' perception of personality prior to symptom onset in 56 outpatients with probable AD. Caregivers also completed the “mood” and “disturbed behavior” scales of the Nurses' Observation Scale for Geriatric Patients. A neuropsychiatrist rated depressive symptoms on the Cornell Scale for Depression and the occurrence of personality change in four domains according to ICD-10. Under statistical control of confounding variables, results showed a moderate association between (high) premorbid neuroticism, subsequent troublesome behavior, and personality change, on the one hand, and (low) frustration tolerance and depression, on the other. Premorbid personality traits may indeed predispose to subsequent noncognitive symptoms in AD.

Two equivalent special care nursing home units for elders with dementing illness were randomly designated as experimental and control units for an intervention called the “stimulation-retreat” model. This model introduced a set of staffing and program changes whose purpose was to diagnose, prescribe, and apply a package of care according to individual needs for additional stimulation or relief from stimulation (“retreat”). A total of 49 experimental and 48 control unit residents completed 12 months of care and were evaluated at baseline, 6 months, and 12 months. It was hypothesized that the intervention would not affect the basic disability (cognitive and activities of daily living functions), would improve negative behaviors and observed affects, and would have maximum impact in increasing positive behaviors and affects. Over time, most functions worsened, including negative attributes and affects. Lesser decline in positive affect and increases in external engagement, however, led to the conclusion that the intervention showed a marginally significant and selective effect on positive behaviors and affect.

Many residents in long-term-care facilities demonstrate agitated behaviors. Research on behavioral approaches for reducing agitation in nursing home residents has been conducted during the past 25 years. This research is critically reviewed in this article and suggestions for future research are offered. Empirical evidence suggests that behavioral approaches are effective. Antecedent control strategies have been shown to reduce physically nonaggressive behaviors. Both aggressive and verbally agitated behaviors have been successfully treated by manipulating reinforcing consequences of these behaviors. Future research in this area needs to test behavioral treatments using randomized group designs, compare behavioral interventions to other treatments used alone or in combination, specify criteria for clinically significant improvement, diversify and ascertain the validity of assessment methods, and verify the maintenance of treatment effects over relatively long follow-up periods.

The objective of this study was to assess the psychometric properties of a new instrument, the Delirium Index (DI), to measure changes in the severity of the symptoms of delirium among patients previously diagnosed with delirium. Subjects were medical inpatients aged 65 and over diagnosed with delirium by the Confusion Assessment Method. Interrater reliability of the DI was .78 between research assistants (concordence coefficient) and was .88 between research assistants and geriatric psychiatrists. Criterion validity, assessed by the correlation between DI and Delirium Rating Scale scores (Spearman's correlation coefficient, r), was .84. Construct validity was assessed using correlations of the DI with two measures of current function for convergent validity (r = −.60, −.70) and two measures of function before admission for discriminant validity (r = .26, −.42). We conclude that the DI has acceptable levels of interrater reliability, criterion validity, and construct validity.

The quality of information given to family members of patients with Alzheimer's disease was studied. The patients had participated in a pharmacological investigation. The relatives were generally satisfied with the information given, and perceived it as adequate. The reasons given for allowing the patients to participate in the investigation were mainly altruistic.