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Can dementia change personality?

A fellow caregiver asked...

Can dementia change personality? There are many times when it's obvious that she knows what she is doing, especially when she is angry. She is combative and screams for hours at a time. How do we handle dementia personality changes?

Expert Answer

Beth Spencer is a social worker in Ann Arbor, Michigan, with more than 25 years of experience with families who have a member with dementia. She is coauthor of Understanding Difficult Behaviors and Moving a Relative with Memory Loss: A Family Caregiver's Guide. Previously, she directed Silver Club, early-stage and adult day programs serving individuals with Alzheimer's disease and related illnesses.

Dementia can, indeed, change a person’s personality if the part of the brain where personality is lodged is damaged. Sometimes there are situations or people that are triggering this behavior. It can be helpful to keep a log of when and under what conditions she gets so angry and out of control. Is it around a particular task, such as bathing? A particular time (or times) of day? The way someone is talking to her? Is she in pain that she can’t express? There are many possible causes of these behaviors. The Alzheimer’s Association offers a way to think through what is happening.

It's also important to enlist some medical help here as you are describing some very difficult behaviors. Ask her physician about medications that might help. It's uncomfortable for her to be in that much distress;  sometimes a medication can be helpful in taking the edge off.