Introduction: Patients with Down syndrome are submitted to faster aging than other population, at the same time they are more susceptible to develope Alzheimer's disease. They have limited cognitive skills and due to lack of knowledge of health care professionals about it, disease can remain unnoticed and consequently undiagnosed. Aim: The aim of this thesis is to determine the type of problems older persons with Down syndrome are facing, the first signs of Alzheimer's disease in people with Down syndrome, how to detect Alzheimer's disease in person with Down syndrome and what is the role of nurse with person with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease. Methods: Descriptive research method with a systematic review of the available scientific and professional literature has been used in this diploma thesis. The literature has been limited in time frame from the year of 2005 to 2017, searched in international databases » CINAHL with full text, MEDLINE, Cochrane, Scopus, PubMed, DiKUL and COBISS.SI. Some sources were found with Google. The key words for searching in databases were: Down syndrome, Alzheimer's, Alzheimer's disease, nursing, aging. The total number of used literature is 55 articles. Results: People with Down syndrome can experience the first signs of Alzheimer's disease at the age of 50. Early signs include personality changes and changes in behaviour. Such changes may remain undetected if previously person with Down syndrome is not assessed for the exact state of health. The key role of nurse is to raise awareness and education of the people who care for persons with Down syndrome and to teach persons with Down Syndrome themselves about the nature of Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease together. Discussion and conclusion: Disease can be diagnosed a lot earlier, if there is awarenes of symptoms, enough materials about this subject available. The patient has to be included in the process. Inevitable decline in the health status of a person with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease can be slow down through early detection and diagnosis which brings planing about appropriate accommodations for person with Down syndrome and Alzheimer's disease.
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