Alzheimer's Disease

Alzheimer's Disease: A Slow Death of the Mind

This report is a study on the effects of senile dementia, also known as Alzheimer's disease, often abbreviated SDAT for Senile Dementia of the Alzheimer Type. Once divided into two different diagnoses, today Alzheimer's disease and senile dementia are regarded as one disease (Heston and White, 1983, p. 15). While there is much information today on the scientific and medical aspects of Alzheimer's disease, information about how it affects not only the victim, but also others concerned is just now beginning to become available.

Alzheimer's, the "slow death of the mind," is one of the cruelest diseases because it kills its victims twice. First, the mind dies, taking with it the personality and all that was the person. Then the body dies after a long degenerative process robs it of the ability to walk, talk or control elemental functions.

Families are torn apart physically, emotionally and financially as they struggle to cope with watching a beloved, once dynamic and integral member of their family gradually forgetting dates and names and eventually failing to recognize even the closest members of his or her own family. At that stage, the patient must either be placed in a nursing home or be kept at home with the family, requiring nearly constant, 24-hour care.

A Brief History of Alzheimer's Disease

In 1906, a German neurologist named Alois Alzheimer encountered a woman with all the symptoms of severe d

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ric medicine will help dispel any unnecessary fears. The later stages' symptoms are the most devastating both to patient and family; during this period, the financial burden also begins pressing the family hard. At this point, most families elect to place the Alzheimer victim in a nursing home. The patient becomes incontinent, loses most judgmental abilities and experiences extreme difficulty in performing even the simplest rote gestures. The patient often becomes agitated and, in some cases, even sociopathic. In the final stage of Alzheimer's, the patient developed contractures of the face and limbs and curls into a fetal position, gradually slipping into coma and then death. Increasing the awfulness of this disease, the degenerative process lasts from five to 10 years, and cases as long as 20 years have been recorded (Bellak and Karasu, 1976, p. 130). The cause of Alzheimer's disease is not known. However, scientists are beginning to understand what occurs during the disease process. In normal aging, some of the cells of the brain, called neurons, begin to die. The neurofibrillary tangles mentioned earlier are comprised of these dead neurons which form lesions. Researchers in one study found that "it likely takes an

Category: Medical - A