# Neurocognitive Disorders --- A **neurocognitive disorder** is a [[disease]] that affects the mind and [[cognition]]. Neurocognitive disorders are classified as either [[delirium]] or a major or minor neurocognitive disorder due to a particular disease. For example, you might see "major neurocognitive disorder due to [[Alzheimer's disease]]" or "minor neurocognitive disorder due to vascular dementia". The disease that can lead to a neurocognitive disorder are: - [[Alzheimer's disease]] - frontotemporal lobar degeneration - Lewy body dementia - vascular dementia - [[traumatic brain injury]] - substance or medication use - [[HIV]] infection - Prior disease - [[Huntington's disease]] - other or unknown medical conditions ## Dementia vs Pseudodementia • Severe [[depression]] can lead to impairments in attention, executive functioning, memory and social cognition. • In older adults severe depression can easily mimic symptoms of neurocognitive disorder. • Symptoms can improve with effective treatment and improvement of the depression. ## Medications for Dementia Nothing works. Some medications have modest short term benefits of delaying the onset of the most severe symptoms, but there is no evidence that any medications we know of alter disease progression in the long run. Even those that these help are early in the disease process. ___