Important insights about Alzheimer’s disease and dementia

The brain and the heart are two of the most important and sensitive organs in the human body. A variety of diseases originate in these organs and can potentially prove to be fatal. However, if diagnosed at the right time, the treatment can begin from an early stage and high-intensity damage can be avoided. Following is some important information about Alzheimer’s disease, a common form of dementia, a disorder that affects millions of Americans.

What is Alzheimer’s disease?

• A chronic neurodegenerative disease, Alzheimer’s disease starts at a slow pace but worsens gradually.
• It starts with short-term memory loss and is attributed to be the cause for 60% to 70% of dementia cases.
• The main risk factors for this disease include a history of depression, head injuries, and/or hypertension.
• It is an extremely challenging disorder to endure because this disease calls for almost complete dependence on external assistance to carry out normal day-to-day functions and activities.

What is dementia?

• Dementia is a collective term used to describe the occurrence of a host of symptoms associated with the functioning of the brain.
• These functions of the brain that may be affected include impairment of thinking skills, loss of memory, lack of judgment, or a combination of these. A person affected with dementia may experience hampering of the ability to carry out daily functions and may find it challenging to keep up with normal functions.
• The two types of dementia are cortical dementias, which includes disorders such as Alzheimer’s and Creutzfeldt-Jakob, and subcortical dementias, which comprises disorders such as Huntington’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.

What are the causes of dementia and Alzheimer’s disease?

• In very rare cases, dementia may be caused by a reaction to vitamin deficiencies or different medications. Vascular dementia is caused due to an issue in blood vessels and Lewy body dementia (LBD) is caused due to abnormal clumps in the brain that are made up of protein.
• However, the most common cause of dementia is Alzheimer’s disease, which in turn may be caused due to various different reasons such as a combination of lifestyle, genetic, age, and environmental factors.
• Other causes of Alzheimer’s disease include plaques, which are clumps of the beta-amyloid protein. These clumps may be formed toward the outside of brain cells causing brain damage.
• Tangles are another cause of Alzheimer’s disease. A protein called tau (τ proteins) twists into tangles inside the brain cells, which hampers the internal transport system of the brain. This system is responsible for passing essential materials and crucial nutrients throughout the extensions of brain cells.

What symptoms signify the presence of Alzheimer’s disease and dementia?

The symptoms signifying Alzheimer’s disease and dementia are almost similar. However, these symptoms are a lot more severe in Alzheimer’s disease and may differ as per the type of dementia. The occurrence of Alzheimer’s disease may be characterized by the following change in brain functions:

• Reasoning, concentration, and thinking
• Issues in judgment and decision-making
• Challenges while carrying out regular functions
• Significant changes in behavior such as apathy, withdrawal from society, mood swings, the feeling of distrust, and loss of inhibitions, amongst many others.

How do you treat Alzheimer’s disease and dementia?

• Alzheimer’s disease is not a curable disease. However, the symptoms in a patient can be managed with medications and therapy for behavioral changes, memory loss, sleep changes, and depression.
• To treat dementia, patients must treat the cause of dementia. Some of the causes that can be treated include hypoglycemia, metabolic disorders, and tumors. In most cases, dementia is irreversible.

While the symptoms for both Alzheimer’s disease and dementia may be similar, it is important to differentiate between the two so as to chart out the right treatment course. If one feels any of the aforementioned symptoms recurring, then it is best to seek medical intervention at the earliest.