Dementia Wandering Takes Two Different Forms
Early on, the walk has a destination from the past. Later, it continues until brush, water, or a fence stops them.
Bear Brook · A Private Matter, Episode 4Search expert Robert Kester, who has looked for missing people since 1981 and holds a master's degree in neurobiology, learned to separate people with dementia from everyone else over 65.
The old search category lumped together very different people, he says. It covered very fit older adults as well as older adults with dementia.
From cases starting in the 1980s, Kester built data just for dementia. He found two patterns of wandering, tied to how far the condition has progressed.
The first kind is purposeful, at least in the person's mind. Someone tries to reach a specific place, often from the past, and this is linked with milder dementia.
He has seen people trying to get to a friend's funeral, even though the friend died 15 years ago. Jay Hickey, who had dementia, once was found low on McCoy Mountain saying he had to get to the town building for a work meeting, although he had stopped working there three years before.
The second kind is more unnerving. The person keeps moving in the same general direction, following whatever path of least resistance lies directly ahead.
"They go until they get stuck," Kester says. Thick vegetation can stop them, as can a stream, pond, or other water, or a fence, including barbed wire.
That difference shapes where searchers look. Kester says "50% of subjects are found within a half mile" from their last known location, and 75 percent within 1.2 miles, a shorter distance than for lost children ages 7 to 9.
Questions people ask
How far does a lost person with dementia usually travel?
Kester says 50 percent of subjects are found within a half mile from their last known location, and 75 percent within 1.2 miles, for a person on foot in temperate wilderness like New Hampshire. That is a smaller area than for many lost children. In theory, Kester says that 1.2 mile circle could be covered in a few days with at least 24 trained searchers and several dogs.
Why do lost people so often walk in circles instead of backtracking?
People who are lost tend to keep moving forward rather than turn around, even though backtracking can work. Lost people traveling at night or in fog often end up walking in circles. One hypothesis is that one leg is a little shorter than the other.