Dementia

Dementia is a chronic disorder caused by permanent damage or death of brain’s nerve cells or neurons.

Dementia causes long term and gradual decrease in ability to think and remember things making daily functions impossible to perform. The most commonly found form of Dementia is Alzheimer’s accounting for almost 60% of the cases.

Dementia can be caused by stroke or blockage of blood supply which is termed as vascular dementia, it can happen with the abuse of alcohol which is known as alcohol dementia, trauma dementia is caused by a serious head injury, dementia with lewy bodies is linked to abnormal structures of the brain, this brain change involves a protein called alpha-synuclein.

It mostly occurs in people who reach the age above 60 years, women are more prone to develop dementia.

People with this disorder lose the ability to remember things, finding words while speaking and they get lost when they go out all alone.

Here are the symptoms of Dementia, which will help you understand it better.

• Misplacing things – putting things in the wrong place and forgetting about doing so.
• Mood swings – Very fast swings in mood and display of extreme emotions.
• Personality changes – Becoming extremely irritated, suspicious or fearful.
• Disorientation – They forget the street they live in, what is the current date, month or time.
• Problem in Abstract thinking – Dealing with money.
• Poor judgement – in crossing the road or more serious forgetting a child in a park and coming back home.
• Loss of initiative – Showing less initiative in doing things or going somewhere out.
• Difficulty completing familiar tasks – Like cooking a meal, cleaning wardrobe, tying shoelaces.
• Failure to recognize people – They sometimes forget or fail to recognize people they have known before.

Mr B S, 63 a bank manager of a leading bank quit his job abruptly when he realised he has frequently started to make simple calculation mistakes, and forgetting about the place where important documents are kept. One day while going back home, he stopped and brought some groceries and after that when he returned to the car, he forgot the route for his home. He after that incident stopped going for his morning jog, for which he was regular in the past 2 decades, he then started getting extremely suspicious and doubtful of his family members, he thought they are forging his signature and stealing his money and property. He would often forget where he had kept his phone, wallet, T.V remote and keys. His general mood became very discouraged and low. His family members sensed the warning signal one day while watching T.V, he couldn’t recognise the date written on the T.V screen, he thought it was still January 2010 but in real it was January 2014. His tomography scan showed serious cortical atrophy, while being interview he couldn’t recall the name of his college he studied from, the names of his few close friends and the current time of the year.