Alzheimer's, the most common form of dementia, also known as dementia, is a neurological disease that causes a decrease in cognitive functions due to the death of brain cells.
What is Alzheimer's?
Due to the decrease in brain cells caused by the disease, the brain shrinks by shrinking. This leads to memory problems in the person.
It is the most common cause of dementia among the elderly. Symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, which are usually seen after the age of 60, appear gradually and over time affect the person to such an extent that they cannot do their daily work on their own.
The disease, which prevents the patient from controlling his emotions and thoughts, leads to simple, tolerable forgetfulness in the initial period. However, it progresses over time, causing the person to be unable to remember what they did in the recent past. The person becomes unable to recognize friends, family, spouse and even children.
In the last period of the disease, the person cannot meet his own basic needs. Before moving on to the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease, it is necessary to understand what Alzheimer's disease is.
Alzheimer's, a neurological disease, is a type of dementia. In healthy individuals, some loss of brain cells is experienced with advancing age. However, in the presence of Alzheimer's disease, which is a progressive type of disease, this loss progresses much more rapidly.
Alzheimer's develops due to abnormal protein accumulation in nerve cells in the brain. These proteins, which are defined as beta amyloid, increase over time and cannot be removed from the brain tissue. In order for the brain to perform its normal functions, nerve cells must connect with each other. However, due to the accumulation of protein, the bond between these cells is broken and as a result, nerve cells begin to die. The rapid death that occurs in brain cells causes the brain to shrink and therefore to shrink in volume.
The disease, in which the consciousness of the person is affected over time, leads to mild severe forgetfulness at first. These forgetfulness symptoms are at a level that cannot be ignored by the person himself and his relatives. However, since Alzheimer's is a progressive disease, the symptoms get worse over time. average
The early symptoms of the disease are mostly noticed by the person's family. Over time, the person becomes unable to remember his social environment, family and past. Forgetfulness caused by Alzheimer's disease affects memory starting from the present and going into the past. In other words, the person first forgets the last events.
What are the Causes of Alzheimer's?
The exact cause of Alzheimer's disease has not been understood yet. However, it is known that the disease can be triggered by factors such as genetics, lifestyle and environmental factors. Differences in the brain in Alzheimer's disease begin years before the onset of symptoms. Therefore, the person does not realize that he has Alzheimer's.
Due to the accumulation of beta amyloid protein particles in the brain, communication between nerve cells is impaired. Over time, brain cells begin to die faster than those of healthy individuals. These abnormalities in the brain begin in the hippocampus region, which is the part of the brain that concerns memory, and spread to the whole brain over time.
In this situation, which causes the brain to shrink, the brain shrinks and loses many of its functions. All this damage leads to a decrease in the protein called acetylcholine, which is responsible for learning, while the substance called glutamate increases in the brain. In other words, Alzheimer's, which initially affects learning and memory, causes life problems by causing disruption and deterioration in other mental activities as the disease progresses slowly over the years.
The main causes of Alzheimer's can be listed as follows:
- Advanced age,
- Having a family history of Alzheimer's,
- Traumas experienced,
- Asocial lifestyle,
- Depression,
- APOE4 (ApolipoproteinE) gene carrier,
- Low education level,
- Cholesterol,
- Obesity,
- Type 2 diabetes,
- Vacular diseases such as high blood pressure,
- Being with Down syndrome,
- Sleeping problems,
- Imbalanced and unhealthy eating habits,
- Smoking.
What are Alzheimer's Symptoms?
Alzheimer's Disease One of the first symptoms is forgetfulness. Start Even though the forgetfulness, which is mild at first, reduces the quality of life of the person a little, it does not affect the daily activities much. Especially trained people can tolerate this symptom very well. However, in the following period, the quality of life of the person decreases due to the increase in the severity of forgetfulness.
In this period when the person is affected cognitively and behaviorally, it becomes difficult to remember the names of people, objects and places. The person cannot remember recent events or find their way. In the later stage of the disease, the symptoms increase and the patient's life begins to be affected. The person isolates himself from the outside world by closing himself in time.
The symptoms of Alzheimer's disease differ according to the period of the disease:
The Symptoms of the Onset Period are;
- Confusion,
- Forgetting recent events,
- Not being able to remember what was spoken,
- Forgetting the names of people, objects and places,
- Confusing the roads, not being able to find the house,
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- Losing things,
- Constantly talking about the same events,
- Having difficulty in finding words while speaking,
- Decision inability to give,
- Being anxious,
- Changeable mood,
- To be introverted.
Who Gets Alzheimer's?
Researches have revealed that Alzheimer's disease is more common in women than men. The primary reason for this is thought to be that women have a longer life expectancy than men. Apart from the factors that play a role in the formation of Alzheimer's, beta amyloid plaques were found in the brain tissues of people with the disease in the examinations made on Alzheimer's patients. It is thought that this information will play an important role in determining the exact cause of the disease in the coming years.
How to Diagnose Alzheimer's?
It is mostly at the insistence of the family that Alzheimer's patients consult a physician. The physician primarily listens to the patient's story from the person himself and, if necessary, from his family. Then, the balance, senses and behaviors of the person are measured with a neurological examination. A number of neurological memory tests are performed to understand the current state of the person's memory. The physician may request additional tests such as radiology and laboratory tests when deemed necessary. After imaging procedures such as magnetic resonance (MR), computed tomography (CT), positron emission tomography (PET), the physician evaluates the patient. In the light of all the data, the person is diagnosed with Alzheimer's.
What are the Alzheimer's Treatment Methods?
Alzheimer's disease affects the family as well as the person himself. Therefore, before the treatment process, the physician informs the patient's family about how to treat the patient, what to do and what not to do.
There is no treatment yet for the complete elimination of Alzheimer's disease from the body. Current treatment methods can only slow the progression of the disease. With this feature, it is aimed to reduce the patient's complaints.
Alzheimer's treatment differs according to the current state of the disease. Treatment with drugs is usually started at a low dose. As time passes, the dose of drugs is increased. Thus, the quality of life of both the patient and the family caring for the patient increases. Despite all this, the patient gets worse over time due to the progressive nature of Alzheimer's disease.
The person finds it difficult to do their daily work. In this process The patient should be cared for in his own environment. In other words, if the patient does not live with his family, the care of the patient should not be done in one house or another in weekly shifts. Instead, staying at the patient's home and caring for the patient is important for the patient's comfort and mental health.
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