Young-onset dementia growing in Canada. What’s behind this rise?

A growing number of Canadians are developing dementia in their 60s, 50s, 40s and even earlier, and experts are not sure exactly what is behind the worrisome rise.

In May 2021, Heather Sosa, a Vancouver resident, received distressing news from her husband’s medical professionals — they diagnosed him with a mental illness and admitted him to a hospital out of fear for his safety.

But as time unfolded, it became apparent that the initial diagnosis was incorrect. Contrary to the earlier assessment, Heather’s husband, Curt Sosa, was grappling with young-onset Alzheimer’s disease.

Curt was only 62 years old at the time of his diagnosis, but Heather said he had exhibited signs of the disease years earlier. She just didn’t know it was.

“He had more anxiety and there was a depression,” she told Global News. “But I wasn’t so concerned because he was in touch with his doctor almost weekly. So I thought, ‘OK, whatever is going on, the doctor is obviously seeing this, too.'”

But unfortunately, Heather said her husband’s doctor missed the signs. His depression turned into delusions and hallucinations, leading Heather and their family to begin worrying about Curt’s safety.

After getting a mental illness diagnosis at a psychiatric patient centre in Vancouver, Curt was given antipsychotic medication.

“But it just kept getting worse and worse. And we were having regular appointments at the hospital. And finally, they decided they needed to commit him because of how bad it had gotten, as even had an exacto knife in his sock that day,” Heather said.

After 30 days in the psychiatric centre, Curt’s doctors remarked that he didn’t seem like other patients. He was then discharged and that’s when the term dementia started to be used.