A new case of dementia every three seconds is a strong message that highlights how dementia will be the biggest challenges faced by the growing elderly population across the globe in the coming years. In India, the situation is no different; since there is no cure for dementia research plays a crucial role in improving the quality of care. Research in the field of dementia must be encouraged in order to bring about a change in the quality of care and to develop and implement new methods and activities for the active well-being of people of dementia. Objectives: To assess the severity, distress and cognitive functions of dementia patients and to seek association between them. Methodology: Quantitative research approach with non-experimental descriptive survey design was selected for the present study. The sampling technique chosen was non-probability convenient sampling technique for a sample size of 100. The study chosen was from memory clinic of Southern India. The tool consisted of Part A demographic profile with 5 variables. Part B consisted of Clinical dementia rating scale (CDR), Neuropsychiatric symptom inventory (NPI) and Addenbrooke’s cognitive Examination (ACE-III). We analyzed the scores using descriptive and inferential analysis. Association between them was performed using Chi-square. Statistical significance was taken to be p < 0.05. Results: The study shows that the majority were in the age group of 60–70 years. Maximum numbers of dementia clients were females. Duration of cognitive impairment was majorly between 1 and 3 years. The greater part of the diagnosis was of Alzheimer’s dementia and mostly under hospital care. The study also revealed that the CDR score constituted majorly of mild level among dementia clients and out of 85 clients receiving domiciliary services majority had mild impairment of 47%. The NPI-D confirms that 99% had mild distress. Moreover, in Residential care facility out of 5 clients there was equal percentage of mild and severe impairment, i.e. 40%, in Day care service out of 10 clients, half of them had severe impairment, i.e. 50%. Furthermore, NPI-FxS presented 90% with mild distress and ACE-III showed 79% with impaired cognition. There was no association between distress and severity and gender but there is a significant association between diagnosis and cognitive function. Conclusion: Dementia awareness and early detection is the urgent need of the hour, early symptom detection will help in alleviating the distress to a significant level. The interventional package will serve to cater the needs of the dementia patients in various dimensions of holistic health.

Keywords: Cognitive impairment; Alzheimer’s disease; Dementia; Domiciliary Service; Cognition.