Maryland bill would require dementia prevalence reporting and provider outreach; advocates and experts urge passage

House Bill 1004, the Public Health Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias Information on Prevalence and Treatment Act, would require the Maryland Department of Health to publish state‑level data on the prevalence of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias and to expand public-health outreach and provider education about diagnosis and available treatments.

Sponsor Delegate Ashanti Martinez told the Health and Government Operations Committee that the bill aims to make prevalence data and information about new Food and Drug Administration–approved treatments more readily available to Marylanders and to the health providers who care for them. “There’s 127,000 Marylanders that we know of that have this disease, and there's another additional 247,000 Marylanders who are…