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In this high-tech postmodern culture of ours, we have access to opportunities, options, and official information on personal health care—that access giving us the ability to prevent, diagnose, and treat the dementias that aging often brings with it. Some of that information is astounding, and hopefully here—listed as useful facts and stats--will help us to improve on our mental health conditions by giving and getting the right personal health care for our seniors.
ALZHEIMER’S
The most common form of dementia in older people, Alzheimer’s affects language and reasoning for the one who has it. This means speech, memory, reason, and logic elude the cerebral cortex in varying degrees. It is as terrifying for the loved ones who witness their elders putting the milk in the bedroom and lit cigarettes in the trash as it is for the patients who cannot grasp the names and words for the content of their conversations.
According to the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry, approximately 4 million Americans currently experience Alzheimer’s. This means over 10% of all Americans over 65 suffer from what is also called AD…or another form of dementia.
BINSWANGER’S DISEASE
Binswanger’s Disease is brought on by cerebrovascular lesions that affect a number of brain functions. Personal health care for seniors will not often have to be concerned, though, as it is rare. This disease is devastating, however: it affects memory, cognition, and mood, and as well, causes urinary dysfunction (incontinence), awkward and clumsy movement, slow reaction, and speech impediment.
The symptoms of Binswanger’s Disease will likely begin after the age of 60 and are sometimes not found in patients except as part of passing phases.
CREUTZFELDT-JAKOB DISEASE
Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease (also known as CJD) is a degenerative brain disorder that while rare, is fatal. All of the three types—or categories—of CJD, sporadic CJD, hereditary CJD, and acquired CJD, occur or begin to develop after the age of 60.
There is currently no single diagnostic test for CJD.
CJD can be transmitted to other people, though the risk is extremely minimal.
LEWY BODY DISEASE
Lewy Body Disease is a also a dementia which is caused by damage in the brain. Similar to Alzheimer's disease, the symptoms are also those concerned with personal health care and independence: the patient develops memory loss, speech impediment, and cognitive difficulty. It also includes an impaired ability to reason, to judge distances, and to carry out simple tasks.
Lewy Body Disease is named after the doctor who first discovered and wrote about the deposits which are found in the brain after death, round deposits which contain damaged nerve cells.
A number of other dementias—such as Multi-infarct Dementia, Parkinson’s Dementia, and Alcohol and AIDS related dementias—are of concern for those of us involved in the personal health care of our elders. But prognosis overall is that doctors have are constantly and consistently at work to identify the conditions and symptoms and to develop ways to treat such dementias. As the NINDS professionals attest, the positive to these is that many of the conditions and symptoms are reversible.
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