September 2012 is the first global "World Alzheimer's Month". Its aim is to challenge and consequently decrease the stigma* associated with dementia and make communities more "dementia friendly" so that many suffers become less isolated. To do this events have been set up all over the world this month!
Dementia is a term used to describe different brain disorders that affect memory, thinking, behaviour and emotion.
To give you an idea of scale there are currently more than 36 million people worldwide living with dementia.
General early symptoms of dementia include; memory loss, difficulty performing familiar tasks, speech difficulties and mood changes.
Although the symptoms can be generalised it must be remembered that everyone is unique and two dementia suffers are very unlikely to experience exactly the same symptoms.
Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia and therefore the cause which I am going to focus on. There are other causes too, for example vascular disease, where vessels supplying brain cells become narrower or blocked and this can cause these cells to seize functioning and die.
Alzheimer's disease causes nerve cells in particular regions of the brain to die. As a consequence messages cannot be transmitted in the brain, particularly those associated with memory and speech. Not only do nerve cells die but there is also a lack of some important chemicals associated with the transmission of messages. The disease is progressive meaning the damage to nerve cells increases over time causing the symptoms to become more pronounced and severe.
"Tangles" and "plaques" of protein molecules in the damaged areas of the brain can be seen under a microscope. Such images would confirm the diagnosis as Alzheimer's disease.
More detailed information on Alzheimer's disease can be found here!
Age is the greatest risk factor for dementia, it affects "one in fourteen people over the age of 65 and one in six people over the age of 80".
In terms of treatment there is currently no cure. At the moment early diagnosis is very beneficial and drug treatments are used to stabilise some of the symptoms/slow progression.
* "a mark of disgrace associated with a particular circumstance, quality or person" (Oxford English Dictionary)
No comments:
Post a Comment