Cinema, literature and technology in favour of the teacher education: a media rereading of Frankenstein

It is discussed that the Brazilian teacher education needs to be reformulated due to the world has changed and also the school clientele. According to a technological world and the increasing widespread use of media, the proposal, which will be described here, emerged. Through the movie I, Frankenstein (2014), a media rereading of the book has been proposed. It is a fact that the cinema is a tool that mobilizes mental schemes and one of its characteristics is to appropriate a spontaneous pleasure. Consequently, the project aimed at develops proposals that the undergraduate students could use with their future students in the classroom. Then, the project gathered media, literature and technology, demonstrating that the cross-cutting themes can be significantly developed, considering the reality of the students\u27 lives

Validity and Reliability of the Frontotemporal Dementia Rating Scale (FTD-FRS) for the Progression and Staging of Dementia in Brazilian Patients

Introduction: Few studies on instruments for staging frontotemporal dementia (FTD) have been conducted.  Objective: The objective of this study was to analyze the factor structure, internal consistency, reliability, and convergent validity of the Brazilian version of the Frontotemporal Dementia Rating Scale (FTD-FRS).  Methods: A total of 97 individuals aged 40 years and above with >2 years’ education took part in the study, 31 patients diagnosed with behavioral variant FTD (bvFTD), 8 patients with primary progressive aphasia, 28 with Alzheimer disease, 8 with mild cognitive impairment, and a control group of 22 healthy subjects. The FTD-FRS was completed by family members or caregivers, and Neurologists completed the 8-item Clinical Dementia Rating for Frontotemporal Lobar Degeneration (CDR-FTLD) scale (6 original domains plus Language and Behavior). The Alzheimer disease and FTD patients had equivalent disease severity level.  Results: The internal consistency of the FTD-FRS, estimated by Cronbach α, was 0.975 whereas test-retest reliability was 0.977. Scree plot and exploratory factor (Varimax rotation) analyses revealed the existence of 4 factors, with eigenvalues >1, which together explained 77.13% of the total variance with values of 1.28 to 17.52. The domains of the Brazilian version of the FTD-FRS scale correlated with the domains of the CDR-FTLD.  Conclusions: The present study is the first to document the factorial structure of the FTD-FRS and its convergent validity with the CDR-FTLD. These tools are key to determine dementia severity in FTD. The Brazilian FTD-FRS demonstrated adequate psychometric properties for use in Brazil. This instrument may contribute to disease staging in FTD and may help to document intervention-related changes

Disease progression in frontotemporal dementia and Alzheimer disease: the contribution of staging scales

Introduction: There is a shortage of validated instruments to estimate disease progression in frontotemporal dementia (FTD). Objectives: To evaluate the ability of the FTD Rating Scale (FTD-FRS) to detect functional and behavioral changes in patients diagnosed with the behavioral variant of FTD (bvFTD), primary progressive aphasia (PPA) and Alzheimer disease (AD) after 12 months of the initial evaluation, compared to the Clinical Dementia Rating scale - frontotemporal lobar degeneration (CDR-FTLD) and the original Clinical Dementia Rating scale (CDR). Methods: The sample consisted of 70 individuals, aged 40+ years, with at least two years of schooling, 31 with the diagnosis of bvFTD, 12 with PPA (8 with semantic variant and 4 with non-fluent variant) and 27 with AD. The FTD-FRS, the CDR and the two additional CDR-FTLD items were completed by a clinician, based on the information provided by the caregiver with frequent contact with the patient. The Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination-Revised (ACE-R) was completed by patients. After 12 months, the same protocol was applied. Results: The FTD-FRS, CDR-FTLD and CDR detected significant decline after 12 months in the three clinical groups (exception: FTD-FRS for PPA). The CDR was less sensitive to severe disease stages. Conclusions: The FTD-FRS and the CDR-FTLD are especially useful tools for dementia staging in AD and in the FTD spectrum