Understanding Alzheimer’s Disease

Few things can rob a persons life as completely as Alzheimer’s can. It steals a person’s memories, family, and dreams.

It is a progressive, irreversible disorder with no cure. There are dozens of theories about the causes of Alzheimer’s disease, but none satisfies the medical community. It attacks without warning, and works slowly. The only thing that everyone agrees on is that Alzheimer’s is a fatal form of dementia.
Symptoms include memory loss, confusion, impaired judgment, disorientation, loss of language skills, and even a personality change.

At least 4.5 million Americans wil have Alzheimer’s disease and by 2050. Approximately, 350,000 new cases of Alzheimer's disease are diagnosed each year and 59,000 patients die. Estimates put the number of people who currently suffer with Alzheimer’s disease at 18 million people.

Alzheimer’s hits every nation where life expectancy has increased until it is considered a commonplace disease This figure is projected to nearly double by 2025 to 34 million people.

Alzheimer's Disease Research (ADR), a program of the American Health Assistance Foundation, funds research, and educate the public about Alzheimer's disease. ADR has awarded $46.8 million to support research in diverse fields from molecular biology to epidemiology.

AHAF played a role in Dr. Stanley Prusiner's Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1997 for his landmark research on prions. More than $1.2 million in research grants were awarded to Dr. Prusiner through the ADR program to develop his prion theory as a model for Alzheimer's disease.

The brain does change shape after Alzheimer’s hits as shown in this diagram: http://www.ahaf.org/alzdis/about/BrainAlzheimer.htm

Alzheimer's causes shrinkage of brain tissue. The grooves or furrows in the brain, called sulci (plural of sulcus), widen and the gyri (plural of gyrus) shrinks. The ventricles, or chambers in the brain that contain the cerebrospinal fluid, become enlarged.

Short-term memory begins to decline (see box labeled ‘memory') first when cells in the hippocampus start to degenerate. Followed by the ability to perform routine tasks.

Alzheimer's spreads through the cerebral cortex (the outer layer of the brain). Judgment declines, emotional outbursts may occur and language is impaired at this stage. Eventually, nerve cells die and resulting in more behavior changes, such as wandering aimlessly and agitation.

The victim cannot recognize faces or communicate in the final stages. Patients may lose bowel and bladder control.
The victim is complete dependent on care, sometimes for year, before they die. Diagnosis to death can span 4 to 20 years.

The Mayo Clinic lists some risk factors. Age is a risk factor as Alzheimer’s hits most patients after 65 years old, which also increases the incidents in women, because they live longer. However, there is also evidence that hormone treatments can reduce the risk factors.

The risk factors for cardio disease may also be risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease. Diabetes may also increase the risk of developing AD. The number of boxers who end up with AD leads some researchers to believe that head injuries can increase the risk of developing AD.

Education and mental activity appear to have a positive aspect. This is based on the fact that uneducated people are more likely to develop AD.