This Special Issue provides a systematic examination of the neuropsychiatric symptoms (NPS) and non-cognitive prodromes of dementia, with an eye toward validating the construct of mild behavioral impairment (MBI).

Our successes in improving life expectancy has led to increased years of life lived with multimorbidity and dementia with increased support needs. Much of the support given to frail older people is provided by family and informal support networks with significant impact on their physical, psychological, and financial well-being. Demographic and societal changes are reducing the capacity of family to offer this care. Formal home-based, center-based, and long-term/residential/nursing home care services are predominately provided by untrained care staff working under supervision from nursing staff. Difficulties recruiting and retaining these staff is leading to major challenges to meeting the needs of older people (Chenoweth et al., 2010). This volume contains a number of studies focusing on ways to improve care provided by these services for frail older people. The approach underpinning these papers and many perspectives of good quality care for older people is the need to be person-centered where the older person identifies their own goals for care and assessment of need, employing a holistic and strength-based approach incorporating their interests, values, and capacities (Vernooij-Dassen and Moniz-Cook, 2016).

Delirium is one of the most prevalent and disabling conditions impacting older adults in hospitals and long-term care settings. The estimates of frequency of delirium in hospitals and nursing homes among older adults range widely, yet it is safe to assume that perhaps as many as 25–30% of elderly individuals in hospitals experience an episode of delirium, often undetected unless a regular screening process is implemented. Until the past couple of decades, actual research into delirium had been sparse and done little to inform clinical practice. Engel and Romano (1959) published a classic review nearly 60 years ago, which served for decades as the foundational article for understanding delirium. In recent years, however, our understanding of delirium has increased dramatically, from the basic neuropathological underpinnings through screening and diagnosis to treatment. In this issue of International Psychogeriatrics, five papers are published, which further expand our knowledge of delirium. The papers cover a range of topics including the frequency of delirium in a primary care setting, outcomes predicted by various diagnostic systems, cognitive function measures as they relate to delirium motor subtypes, screening for delirium using a standardized drug screen, and the effectiveness of multimodal interventions for preventing delirium in older hip fracture patients. What are the take home lessons from these studies?

It is a great honor and a privilege to be appointed as the new Editor-in-Chief of the International Psychogeriatrics (IPG), the flagship journal of the premier international geriatric psychiatry organization – the International Psychogeriatric Association (IPA). I am a proud Life Member of the IPA, and have been involved in different activities of the IPA over the past three decades.

The publication of four papers concerning non-pharmacological interventions for persons with dementia heralds progress in the science of dementia care. The four papers are very diverse in focus and methodology, and include a study of the impact of a visual arts program on quality of life, communication, and well-being by Windle et al. (2017); an overview of systematic reviews of pharmacological and non-pharmacological interventions for the treatment of behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia by Dyer et al. (2017); a systematic review of the efficacy of intervention in people with Lewy body dementia by Morrin et al. (2017); and a protocol of the Behavior and Evolution of Young Onset Dementia part two (BEYOND-II) study, an intervention study aimed at improvement in the management of neuropsychiatric symptoms in institutionalized people with young onset dementia by van Duinen-van den IJssel et al. (2017).

Social aspects of dementia are becoming increasingly important as part of a wider shift in emphasis from cure to care. This is partly because approaches based on finding a cure have proved far more difficult and complex than originally imagined (WHO, 2016). New evidence on the effectiveness of public health measures, that while incidence is growing as the proportion of older people in society increases its prevalence amongst older adults is actually falling, has also lead to increased interest in social dimensions of prevention, lifestyle change, and practical intervention in community settings (Prince et al., 2016; Kivipelto et al., 2017). This, in turn, has led to a rediscovery of the role of supports to people living with dementia in their daily lives, the needs of informal carers, and professional activities that can maintain the social engagement of each party (Winblad et al., 2016). The expansion of practice around person-centered care, beyond traditional institutional settings, has also contributed to a socialized view of how interactions in dementia care are thought about (Bartlett et al., 2017), as has an increased awareness of the effects of the social construction of dementia in the public mind (Biggs, 2018). Most recently, people living with dementia, and particularly with respect to younger onset dementia, have begun to find a voice and to make connections to the wider disability movement (Dementia Alliance International, 2017). Each of these developments, in their different ways, have led to a re-emphasis on psycho-social elements of dementia, its experience, and how that might translate into clinical practice and service delivery.

Neuroimaging continues to be an exciting and rapidly evolving research field producing findings to inform clinical medical practice. Neuroimaging research has enabled a better understanding of in vivo structural, functional, and molecular neuropathology. Moreover, it has the potential to improve clinical care, where clinical assessment alone is sometimes insufficient to provide accurate diagnosis and prognosis. The future direction of neuroimaging is likely to focus on identifying imaging biomarkers suggestive of underlying preclinical disease, understanding the temporal progression from preclinical disease to overt clinical manifestation, and monitoring the therapeutic efficacy of potential disease-modifying agents.

Positive psychiatry is the science and practice of psychiatry that focuses on psycho-bio-social study and promotion of well-being and health through enhancement of positive psychosocial factors (such as resilience, optimism, wisdom, and social support) in people with illnesses or disabilities as well as the in community at large (Jeste and Palmer, 2015). It is based on the principles that there is no health without mental health and that mental health can be improved through preventive, therapeutic, and rehabilitative interventions to augment positive psychosocial factors. Positive psychiatry is not a naïve, feel-good pseudoscience that views the world through rose-colored glasses. It is an evidence-based approach to understanding normal behavior as well as psychopathology and to improving well-being by measuring and enhancing positive psychosocial factors (Jeste et al., 2015).

Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is a clinical condition conceptualized as a stage between normal cognition and dementia. To diagnose it requires subjective cognitive impairment, evidence of cognitive impairment on cognitive testing but no abnormality in a person's functioning and no evidence of dementia (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). There has been growing interest in the condition over the past two decades or so because people with MCI are much more likely than people with no cognitive impairment to progress to dementia (Roberts et al., 2013). However, a significant percentage of people with MCI will not progress to dementia and some will revert to having normal cognition. Rates of progression and reversion to normal cognition vary widely in different studies (Manly et al., 2008). People with MCI experience worry about their symptoms and this is partly alleviated by receiving a diagnosis of MCI and being reassured they do not have dementia (Gomersall et al., 2017). The benefits of diagnosis also include gaining a greater understanding of their symptoms and accessing clinical support but a significant amount of uncertainty remains with regards to the risk of progression and recipients of the diagnosis remain frustrated at the lack of treatments for MCI (Gomersall et al., 2017). There has been much interest in improving the prediction of progression to dementia from MCI but to date, the best predictors of progression remain structured clinical and functional assessments, with some additional benefit from measures of cortical volume/thickness from brain imaging (Korolev et al., 2016). As yet, however, there are no interventions that can prevent (Kane et al., 2017) or treat (Cooper et al., 2013) MCI so it seems set to remain an important clinical entity for the foreseeable future.

The notion of social health (Huber et al., 2011) as applied to dementia care research was introduced to redress the balance of empirical studies that tended to focus on biomedical, cognitive, and functional status in dementia (Vernooij-Dassen and Jeon, 2016). The introduction of social health has followed the zeitgeist of campaigners for a better life for those living with dementia, with initiatives to improve the social images of dementia (Alzheimers.org, 2017). Examples from social research in dementia to examine friendships and the social environments of people with dementia exist (Medeiros et al., 2012), but introduction of the paradigm of social health in dementia (Vernooij-Dassen and Jeon, 2016) has harnessed a growing research agenda (de Vugt and Dröes, 2017). This paradigm provides an umbrella concept to study how social aspects influence the dynamic balance between opportunities and limitations in dementia. Social health goes beyond the neuropathology of dementia, to understand how people, their social networks and wider society with its norms, interact with the condition (Vernooij-Dassen and Jeon, 2016). It is not far removed from the ideas of Tom Kitwood, the pioneer of person-centered dementia care, who noted that “personhood is a standing or status that is bestowed upon one human being, by others, in the context of relationship and social being” (Kitwood, 1997). The INTERDEM (Early detection and timely INTERvention in DEMentia, www.interdem.org) psychosocial research agenda aspired to improve knowledge about social inclusion and reciprocal relationships for people with dementia (Moniz-Cook et al., 2011). The concept of social health (Vernooij-Dassen and Jeon, 2016) with its dimensions for dementia research (Dröes et al., 2017) has begun to develop this knowledge-base.

This issue of International Psychogeriatrics contains three papers from three continents that explore the use of sedatives–hypnotics and opioids in the treatment of older adults (Hamina et al., 2018; Machado-Duque et al., 2018; Tseng et al., 2018), and a fourth paper reporting on a qualitative study that addresses the broader question of training needs in dementia in a setting of rapid economic and demographic changes (Xu et al., 2018).

Over the past two decades, caregiver stress has been the subject of scientific inquiry by investigators around the world representing a variety of disciplines. The knowledge base is extensive and growing, particularly as it relates to the phenomenology and correlates of caregiver stress. The six papers published here represent a snapshot of prevailing lines of inquiry and enhance our knowledge regarding: predictors of psychological distress for dementia family caregivers in Japan (Shikimoto et al., 2017) and for Indonesian and Burmese foreign domestic workers caring for frail older adults in Singapore (Ha et al., 2018); identification of a threshold number of behavioral symptoms in those with dementia associated with caregiver distress (Arthur et al., 2017); the influence of specific illness factors on caregiver stress, including comorbid diabetes in patients with Alzheimer's disease (Li et al., 2018) and a comparison of the effects of behavioral disturbances on caregiver burden across three types of dementia (Liu et al., 2017); and the application of data on caregiver stress to inform the development of a multi-component framework for preventing depression in caregivers of those with dementia (Ying et al., 2017).

Dementia is a disorder that arouses major public health interest and concern. It has been projected that there will be a global increase in the number of people affected from about 46.8million in 2018 to 131million by 2050; global cost of care for 2015 was put at US$818 billion (Prince et al., 2015). Consequently, such development will lead to tremendous social and financial cost on family and society. Currently, there is no cure for dementia and that has led to increased research activities on prevention strategies, which often has to start with a number of midlife activities. These include regular exercise, diet, treatment of cardiovascular risk factors, and social and educational stimulation through life.

Our experience evaluating a museum program for people with dementia together with their family members demonstrated benefits for all participants. We hypothesized that participation in a chorus would also have positive effects, giving them an opportunity to share a stimulating and social activity that could improve their quality of life. We inaugurated a chorus for people with dementia and their family caregivers in 2011, which rehearses and performs regularly. Each person with dementia must be accompanied by a friend or family member and must commit to attending all rehearsals and the concert that ensues. A pilot study included a structured assessment, take home questionnaires and focus groups. Analyses of pre-post scores were conducted; effect size was quantified using Cohen's d. Results showed that quality of life and communication with the other member of the dyad improved (Effect size: Cohen's d between 0.32 and 0.72) for people with dementia; quality of life, social support, communication and self-esteem improved (d between 0.29 and 0.68) for caregivers. Most participants stated that benefits included belonging to a group, having a normal activity together and learning new skills. Participants attended rehearsals in spite of harsh weather conditions. The chorus has been rehearsing and performing together for more than 6 years and contributing to its costs. Results of this pilot study suggest that people in the early to middle stage of dementia and their family members and friends can enjoy and learn from rehearsing and performing in concerts that also engage the wider community. It is essential to conduct additional larger studies of the benefits of participating in a chorus, which may include improved quality of life and social support for all, and reduced cognitive decline among people with dementia.