The Swiss medical community defends patients with Alzheimer's disease

Major Swiss medical institutions require that mandatory health care facilities reimburse the diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer's disease.

Fifteen institutions issued a statement to this effect Sunday to counter the prevailing skepticism about the existence and treatability of this disease that affects a growing number of Swiss.

Alzheimer's Switzerland and the Memory Center of the University Hospital of Geneva (HUG) are among the organizations that have adopted this position, in line with the National Strategy for Dementia 2014-2019.

Dementia, according to these institutions, is clearly a disease that is not part of the normal aging process. The causes are mainly neurodegenerative or vascular.

Patients, they say, have the right to receive the best treatment.

"This position, at the root of a long reflection, was necessary to the enormous responsibility that we badume towards our patients," said at the Swiss news agency Keystone-SDA, Professor Giovanni Frisoni, Director of the HUG Memory Center.

It is also about responding to "deniers" for whom Alzheimer's disease is not a disease. "This minority makes a lot of noise but does not contribute in any way to the reflection on the disease and in search of therapies", regrets the Frisian.

In France, notes he, the costs of drugs for dementia have not been reimbursed by health insurance since last year. Aricept, Ebixa, Exelon and Reminyl products are the only ones approved and reimbursed in Switzerland.

"Without them, there is no alternative," says the professor at the HUG memory center.

Although these drugs do not treat Alzheimer's disease, they have nonetheless proven their effectiveness. According to the joint statement, they temporarily improve the condition of patients or stabilize cognitive symptoms up to 18 months.

Early diagnosis and treatment also improves people's independence, allowing them to live longer at home. The combination of pharmacological and non-pharmacological therapeutic approaches is necessary and is highlighted in the synthesis document.

There are currently 151,000 people with dementia in Switzerland. Due to demographic changes, the medical community estimates that 300,000 people will be affected by dementia in 2040.

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