Alzeihmer's Disease-Causes and Treatment

4. ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE

The main characteristics of this disease are impairement of memory ,problems with memory,reasoning and planning ,language and perception.Scientifically,it is characterized byan increase in the production or accumulatuion of any specific protein(betamyloid protein)in the brain that leads to nerve cell death.

The possibilityof having this disease increases after the age of 70 and might affect 50% of persons over the age of 85 but its not really a must that a person will develop alzheimer’s disease.

SYMPTOMS

These are the common symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease:

Memory loss

Finding it hard to perform daily activities

Poor judgement

Easily forgetting the time and place they are at

Changes in overall personality

Mood and behavioral changes

Poor thinking

TREATMENT AND MANAGEMENT

Its management consists of medicationand non medication based treatment .There are two different types of pharmaceuticals administered

.

Cholinesterase inhibitors

Administered on patientswith alzheimer’s disease relative to lack of a brain chemical neurotransmitter called acetylcholine .Neurotransmitters are chemical messengers produced by nerves that the nerves use to communicate with each other in order to carry out their functions.Acetycholine is responsible for making new memories so the above named inhibitors block the breakdown of acetylcholine.There are four drugs that have been approved and can be administered i.e Aricept,Exelon ,Razadyneand Cognex.

These drugs usually comewithh side affects such as nausea,vomiting,diarrhea and cramps.These side effects can be controlled by reducing the dose 0r administering the medication with a certain amount of food otherwise most of them are tolerable.