Uncovering Alzheimer's Disease

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As the people around the world are aging, one devastating prognoses they definitely don’t want to hear is Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). According to www.Alz.org, over five million people in America have this debilitating disease and the numbers are only rising. Between the years of 2000 and 2008, the deaths from Alzheimer’s, jumped a shocking 66 percent. (www.alz.org[->0]) The scariest of all is the fact that one does not know if they’re going to get it. What is AD exactly? Alzheimer's disease is a progressive brain disease that slowly destroys memory and thinking skills and, over time, the ability to carry out the simplest tasks of daily living. Many scientists believe that AD results from an increase in the production and accumulation…show more content…
First stage symptoms are usually very hard to detect as they are always thought of normal part of aging. But eventually symptoms of short term memory loss develop and start to consistently interfere with thinking and usual level of functioning. For example, the individual may, on repeated occasions, forget to turn off an appliance or fail to recall which medicines were taken that day. Mild personality changes, such as losing interests previously enjoyed, apathy, and a tendency to withdraw from social interactions, may occur early in the illness. As the disease progresses, problems in conceptual thinking and in other intellectual functions develop. The person may begin to have trouble with figures when balancing a checkbook, with understanding what is being read, or getting lost on familiar routes. Further disturbances in behavior and appearance may also be seen at this point, such as agitation, irritability, and a diminishing ability to dress appropriately. As the AD becomes worst, affected individuals may become confused or disoriented about what month or year it is, be unable to describe accurately where they live. Eventually, patients may wander, be unable to engage in conversation, desultory in mood, uncooperative, and become incontinent. In late stages of the disease, persons may become totally incapable of caring for themselves. Death can then follow, perhaps from pneumonia or some…show more content…
Diagnosis can be determined when certain symptoms are present and when other possible causes of dementia are ruled out. That can be accomplished by preforming various tests such as a CT scan or a MRI. However, the most certain way to find out if someone has Alzheimer’s is to test their brain tissue after

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