The Truth About Alzheimerâ€™s Disease

By: Joseph Then Click author's name for more of his/her articles

The most common form of dementia is Alzheimer’s disease. This degenerative brain disorder destroys a person’s ability to function. People with Alzheimer's slowly lose their ability to reason, learn, communicate and function. Often there are changes such as anxiety, hallucination, agitation, in behavior and personality. Usually it affects both men and women in their 60’s but also affects people that are in their 40’s.

Completely dependant on their caregivers in advanced stages of Alzheimer’s they will need care for all their needs. Depending on the individual, people survive from five to twenty years with the disease.

Symptoms
As people age, mild memory loss and forgetting a few things is very normal. When a person has Alzheimer's, there are often other symptoms such as:

Memory Loss: Forgetting information more often is an early sign. Often a person will not remember they did a few hours earlier such as making a doctors appointment. Not only do they miss the appointment but also they do not remember every having made one.

Language: People with Alzheimer's forget the meaning of even the simplest words and how to use the properly. Because of this, they have trouble talking, writing and often have difficulty with caregivers understanding them.

Jobs: Alzheimer's makes it hard for people to perform even the most common everyday jobs. They may not be able to brush their teeth, answer the telephone or even dress themselves.

Behavior and Personality Changes: A person with Alzheimer's may go from being a very quiet, polite and kind man or woman to being angry, overly aggressive and hitting for no reason. Some will sit watching television for hours to sleeping almost all the time. Alzheimer's cause some adults to make inappropriate sexual gestures or advances.

Common Sense: A person with Alzheimer's may dress inappropriately such as wearing a winter coat outside in 90-degree temperatures. They forget the value of coins and bills, have difficulty buying or paying for a purchase and have no idea what change they should receive.

Disoriented: Everyone has heard of people with Alzheimer's getting lost in their own backyard and unfortunately, this really does happen. Often they cannot even tell you their address or phone number. Many patients will wander off and have to have supervision at all times.

Misplaced Items: Their shoes may end up in the dryer or their wallet in the microwave because Alzheimer's causes people to forget where items belong.

Unfortunately, a person suffering from Alzheimer's disease will eventually not be able to do anything at all. They will lose their ability to walk, read and speak, become incontinent, forget most people and even completely lose their memory. This is a terrible disease and researchers have found no cure for this but hopefully they will in the very soon.

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