Alzheimer’s disease is the most common type of dementia. Damage to your brain’s nerve cells, known as neurons, makes them stop working normally. Some neurons may even die. As more and more cells stop working, your thinking skills and memory decline.
Mild memory problems gradually worsen. When it becomes difficult to perform everyday activities, that is dementia. You may get lost on your way home even though you have traveled the same route for years. You lose the ability to drive, to balance your checkbook, to cook. Then you become unable to feed and bathe yourself. Eventually you can no longer walk or swallow.
You become bed-bound. Finally you die. Some dementias are caused by strokes. Others are related to Parkinson’s disease. Still others are related to infections, shrinkage of particular brain regions, excess fluid in the brain, etc. Sixty, (60), to eighty, (80), percent of dementia cases are due to Alzheimer’s. Your brain accumulates protein fragments outside neurons called plaques, and inside neurons called tangles. Eventually the neurons are damaged. They stop transferring information. Then they die. Right now it is estimated that 5.2 million Americans have Alzheimer’s. About 5 million are 65 or older, while 200,000 have younger-onset Alzheimer’s. For Americans age 65 and up, that’s 11%, or 1 in 9 seniors. And not everyone who has it knows it right now. Some people may not have developed symptoms yet. I don’t know about you, but I find this all very scary. I have had family members who died of Alzheimer’s. I am sure many of you have, too. I’m sure you want to decrease your risk of developing Alzheimer’s. A recent study showed that reducing common risk factors can significantly cut the number of Alzheimer’s cases. So what were those risk factors? Lack of exercise Diabetes Smoking Depression Obesity in middle age High blood pressure in middle age Low education Wow! Do those look familiar? The list looks a lot like the stroke risk factors, doesn’t it? Figure out which of those risk factors apply to you, and change them. You will decrease your risk of developing Alzheimer’s, and of having a stroke. How’s that for multitasking?
