Friday, September 11, 2009

World Alzheimer's Day September 21st

The World Alzheimer's Day falls on September 21st of each year and is dedicated to raising awareness about this disease as the most common form of dementia that impairs mental functioning. As of now there is no cure for the disease but considerable progress in medical research has offerd relief by reducing symptoms. Stem cell research is a promising area in medical resea4rch that raises hope for the cure of this diease in coming future.

What is Alzheimer’s disease

Alzheimer’s disease is a brain disorder that leads to impairments in the business of daily living due to memory loss and cognitive changes. It is a degenerative disease which progresses from mild and irregular memory loss to acute neurological disorder. Changes in the neural settings and its degenaration results in the patient being unable to learn, remember or even relate to others.

Who Suffers from Alzheimer's

It is widely acknowledged that more than 25 million people around the globe suffer from Alzheimer's and mostly affects older people over the age of 65. The genetic factor also comes into play as having a parent, brother, or sister with Alzheimer's increases the risk factor of developing the disease. There are also instances of early onset of familial Alzheimer disease but is is rare and only accounts for a small percentage of Alzheimer disease cases.

Symptoms of Alzheimer
  • Substantial memory loss such with delays in prompt recall, short term, or long term memory

  • Substantial thinking inadequacy in expressing or comprehending language, figuring out familiar objects, poor coordination, and muscle function

  • Confusion with time or place

  • Difficulty in reading judging distance or determining color and contrast
    confused, suspicious, depressed, fearful or anxious
Treatment of Alzheimer's

Although there is currently no cure for stopping the progression of Alzheimer's there are encouraging advances that include both medications and non-drug approaches to improve symptom management. From the medication point of view cholinesterase inhibitors increase the levels of acetylcholine which postpones the postpones the worsening of symptoms and is most commonly prescribed for mild to moderate Alzheimer's disease . Similarly Mematine is used to regulate glutamate in brain which plays a key role in processing information and is found to effectively delay symptoms in patients. Pleases visit the link for animation on Alzheimer's disease.
http://www.healthscout.com/animation/1/7/main.html

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