Psychosocial and legal aspects of oncological treatment in patients with cognitive impairment.

With society getting older and affected by many diseases, more and more people suffer from severe cognitive disorders. As practice shows, the legal situations of such people is often problematic. This is due to a number of factors, such as short time since the deterioration of patient's condition, initial symptoms ignored, social prejudice towards the idea of incapacitation or taking decisions for a patient, complicated procedures and, sometimes, insufficient knowledge of legal regulations.