Dementia Prediction and Risk Reduction: Socio-cultural Insights, Ethical Reflections and Future Developments
7th December 2020
This symposium was organised by the University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG), Germany in cooperation with University of Haifa, Israel with funding from the German-Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research and Development (GIF)
Symposium description (from the event website):
The shift from cure to prevention and prediction by the recent advancements in predictive medicine and biomarkers research provides a new perspective on dementia. The recent emphasis on potentially modifiable risk factors led to the possibility of reducing the risk of developing dementia through a public health approach. With this international and interdisciplinary symposium, we will revisit this new paradigm, which generates new perceptions of the disease and of the persons with the disease, and new recommendations for healthy ageing.
The symposium will bring together worldwide distinguished scholars, scientists and experts from various disciplines, such as gerontology, neurology, bioethics, public health, dementia research, dementia care, social sciences and law to share their knowledge, expertise and experience and to discuss wide-ranging issues capturing contemporary developments in dementia research, prediction and risk reduction. The symposium’s aim is to examine how risk reduction and a very early diagnosis of dementia is currently conceptualized within three interlinked fields: Medical research, public health policy and the public discourse. More specifically, the symposium will address (a) new developments in dementia prediction and risk reduction, (b) ethical and social implications of dementia prediction and very early diagnosis, and (c) stigma, fear and discrimination concerning dementia prediction and diagnosis. We hope that these issues will stimulate legal, cultural and ethical considerations for future practice. It will provide an international platform for a wide range of networking opportunities for advancement of future collaborations. Following the symposium, we plan to write a position paper or a volume/special issue on how to have an ethical, cultural-sensitive, stakeholder-inclusive approach to the new developments in dementia research and prediction.
This virtual symposium is organized within the research project titled “Stakeholders’ Attitudes towards Prodromal Dementia Diagnosis: Psycho-Social and Ethical Implications in Cross-Cultural Comparison”, funded by German-Israeli Foundation for Scientific Research and Development (GIF, grant no: G-1413-119.4/2017) (for further information and the program, please visit the website: https://egmed.uni-goettingen.de/en/research/prof-dr-silke-schicktanz/translate-to-english- altersmedizin-demenz//)
Watch the full video of Richard’s presentation from the Universitätsmedizin Göttingen’s YouTube channel, here:
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