has not been answered definitively is whether Alzheimer's Disease is the cause of decreased acetylcholine in the brain or if the decrease in acetylcholine in the brain causes Alzheimer's Disease (Levine, 1993).
Genetic inheritance is another suggested causal factor. Thus far, however, no causal factor has been established with certainty.
"For both patient and caregiver, Alzheimer's Disease has been characterized as the disease from Hell" (Levine, 1993, p. 32). Alzheimer's Disease as a type of dementia "involving global impairment of intellect or personality without an impairment of consciousnessùa multi-factorial disease that affects behavioral, cognitive, and quality-of-life issues" (Levine, 1993, p. 32).
Alzheimer's patients exhibit a range of behaviors that create difficulties for caregivers (Cole, 1995). These behaviors include anxiety, depression, agitation, and violence. Therapies and management procedures other than pharmacological medications and physical restraint are desirable.
Many Alzheimer's patients who are severely impaired in factual memory show relatively preserved capacity for perceptuomotor learning (Roy & Collin, 1994). The literature of indicates that, although the consequences of identified brain lesions are broadly predictable, clear exceptions to the rule are not uncommon. One study (Katzman, Terry, DeTeresa, Brown, & Davies, 1988, pp. 138-144) of the autopsy findings in 137 nursing home residents who had been classified during life as demented or non-demented on the basis of careful neuropsychological assessment found that, of the 29 subjects who had been classified as non-demented, the autopsy findings in 10 (34 percent) were characteristic of Alzheimer's Disease. Conversely, of the 108 subjects who had been classified as demented, 12 (11 percent) showed no pathological changes in the autopsy. The findings of this study illustrate the difficulties associated with differentiating between A...