DEMENTIA

Dementia



Dementia

Introduction

Dementia generically refers to a state of chronic and progressive dysfunction of brain function that leads to a decline in cognitive abilities of the person. It is a term that is used to explain patients with damaged intellectual ability. People with dementia may no longer be able to think well enough to perform normal activities such as dressing or eating. People suffering from dementia tend to lose their ability to solve problems or control their emotions. There may be personality changes making the patients become agitated or see things that do not exist. It is a global mental impairment affecting all psychic abilities of the brain and gradually altering the emotion and the voluntary activity of the patient and his social behavior.

Figures

The Office of Technology Assessment, attached to the U.S. Congress, approximates that nearly 1.8 million Americans suffer from severe dementia while between 1 and 5 million other Americans have moderate dementia. According to the Alzheimer's Association, almost four million of these people suffer from Alzheimer's disease. It assumed that by 2040; there may be more than 6 million people afflicted with Alzheimer's disease. The incidence of Alzheimer's disease increases almost hundred percent after every five years, after a person turns 65 years old, and nearly half of those 85 and older have some other form of dementia.

Symptoms of Dementia

Symptoms of dementia include loss of short-term memory, inability to analyze problems and to perform tasks without a certain order, confusion, difficulty concentrating, and paranoid behavior, inappropriate or strange. Clinical depression is also an early symptom of dementia (Leibing, Annette, 2006).

Causes of Dementia

Worsening brain capacity can be caused by various diseases and disorders. The National Institute on Aging (National Institute on Aging) has argued that in fact are reversible approximately 100 disorders that may be misconstrued as a serious ...