The shocking fact is 1 in 9 people globally suffer from Alzheimer’s at the age of 65 and beyond.
In most cases, dementia can be the first detectable symptom of various progressive mental diseases.
Are you aware that people can start forgetting even after an attack of cerebral blood vessel damage?
Dementia including Alzheimer’s dementia has become common nowadays. Because of stressful life, various disorders like a stroke can happen and cause dementia. For many mental illnesses, dementia is the first symptom of a progressive illness.
Advanced therapy can cure the symptoms of dementia and help you live a normal life. It can also prevent further progress of the disease and make you feel stress-free.
Let us know about the difference between dementia and Alzheimer’s
Difference between Dementia and Alzheimer’s:
Dementia and Alzheimer’s are not the same disease but are sometimes used interchangeably. Dementia is a general term that indicates loss of memory, lack of performance of daily activities, and lack of communication abilities.
Alzheimer’s is a common form of dementia. This disease affects memory, language, and the process of thoughts and it worsens with time. Symptoms for both dementia and Alzheimer’s can overlap. Let us learn first about dementia.
What are the Symptoms of Dementia?
Symptoms of dementia can be categorized into early symptoms, progressive symptoms, and advanced symptoms.
Following are the early symptoms of dementia.
1. Occasionally forgetting things
2. Losing the way to come back to the house
Symptoms of progressive dementia are the following:
1. Very frequent forgetfulness
2. Improper thought process in mind
3. Asking repetitive same questions again and again
Symptoms of advanced dementia are the following:
1. Unable to remember familiar people and places
2. Abnormal behavior
3. Aggressiveness
4. Depression
Dementia can start with simple episodes of forgetfulness and the person is unable to find a location in a familiar environment.
What are the causes of Dementia?
- Alzheimer’s
is one of the most common causes of dementia.
- Vascular dementia
is caused by blockage of the flow of blood to the brain and is often related to stroke.
Dementia can be caused because by Lewy bodies or deposits of protein in the brain which can disrupt the electrical signals. It can make the person confused and change the pattern of thinking.
- Parkinson’s disease
is a disease that affects cognitive ability and causes dementia in the course of 10 years.
- Frontotemporal dementia
is a type of dementia that affects the forebrain and is associated with behavioral changes.
- Creutzfeldt Jacob disease:
This is an infectious disease that affects more than 500 people globally every year and is associated with improper muscle coordination and dementia.
- Mixed Dementia:
this is a combination of vascular dementia and Alzheimer’s disease and roughly affects older patients.
- Huntington’s disease:
This can cause dementia as the neuronal cells in the brain start breaking down.
We have read about different causes of dementia. Now let’s read about Alzheimer’s disease.
What is Alzheimer’s disease?
This is a progressive disease that affects memory and cognitive function in the brain.
It can start at the age of 65-70.
The main cause of Alzheimer’s disease is the deposit of plaques and tangles in the brain. Plaques are lumps of proteins that accumulate in the neurons and disrupt their activity.
Tangles are proteins that twist together and cause the death of normal brain cells. There is shrinkage of the brain due to Alzheimer’s. It is not possible to diagnose this disease with complete accuracy. But the doctors are correct 90% of the time with the diagnosis.
Difference between the symptoms of Alzheimer’s versus dementia:
The symptoms of Alzheimer’s include
- Difficulty in remembering:
- Confusion
- Behavioral changes
- Depression
These symptoms are also common in Lewy body dementia but in this disease , people also experience hallucinations, lack of balance, and sleep disturbances.
People with Parkinson’s dementia and Huntington’s disease experience involuntarily movement during the course of the disease.
Difference between the treatment of dementia and Alzheimer’s
The treatment for Alzheimer’s is antipsychotics and choline esterase inhibitors.
Choline esterase inhibitors block the breaking down or degradation of acetylcholine, the main component involved in neurotransmission. In the case of dementia, the doctor will first try to find out what type of dementia it is. If it is vascular dementia, then the doctor will prescribe the medicines to prevent damage to blood vessels in the brain.
Advanced treatment –
Stem cell therapy is an advanced treatment option to cure the symptoms of dementia and Alzheimer’s.
In most of the cases of dementia, there is degeneration of healthy neuronal cells ( nerve cells) as a result of protein accumulation.
Stem cell therapy can help in the formation of new neuronal cells and help in the development of new circuits.
All symptoms of dementia like forgetfulness, depression and difficulty in communication can be treated with stem cell therapy.
It is good to start the therapy at an early stage, but at later stages also it can help cure the symptoms to a great extent.
Stem cells for the development of neuronal cells can be isolated from the bone marrow, processed in the laboratory, and injected into the cerebrospinal fluid.
What is the life expectancy of dementia and Alzheimer’s?
The process of vascular dementia can be slowed down but it may not be reversible altogether. Patients with Alzheimer’s generally live with 8 years after diagnosis but their life span can increase up to 20 years. Starting early treatment can help to manage the symptoms better.
Stem cell therapy for Alzheimer’s and dementia
In most of the cases of dementia, there is degeneration of healthy neuronal cells ( nerve cells) as a result of protein accumulation.
Stem cell therapy can help in the formation of new neuronal cells and help in the development of new circuits.
All symptoms of dementia like forgetfulness, depression and difficulty in communication can be treated with stem cell therapy.
It is good to start the therapy at an early stage, but at later stages also it can help cure the symptoms to a great extent.
Stem cells for the development of neuronal cells can be isolated from the bone marrow, processed in the laboratory, and injected into the cerebrospinal fluid.
Conclusion
Dementia including Alzheimer’s dementia is a progressive disease with various symptoms including depression and aggressiveness at a later stage. In conventional treatment regimes, medicines can control the symptoms to some extent, but cannot cure the disease.
Stem cells have the ability to cure the symptoms and stop the progression of the disease completely.
FAQ :
Q1. Is dementia a stage of Alzheimer’s?
Dementia is observed among Alzheimer’s patients in the early stages of the disease.
Q2.how to cure Alzheimer’s and dementia?
The symptoms of the diseases can be cured by stem cell therapy. In conventional medicine, the symptoms can be managed.
