dementia Liam alexander

What is dementia? Dementia is a general term used to for the range of symptoms associated with the decline of memory and thinking processes. It can reduce people’s mental and physical abilities to a point in which everyday activities are challenging or not possible. Dementia is a cognitive disorder that effects the brain. There are two major types of dementia, the most common being Alzheimer's, which accounts for 60 – 80% of all cases of dementia, the second most common type is vascular dementia, which instead of occurring from aging, occurs after someone suffering a stroke. (Alzheimer’s association, 2015).

What are the symptoms/features of dementia? Although the symptoms of dementia can vary greatly from person to person, there are some symptoms that generally appear in most if not all cases of dementia. At least two of these core mental functions must be heavily impaired for the illness to be considered dementia: Memory Communication and language Ability to focus and pay attention Reasoning and judgment Visual perception (Alzheimer’s association, 2015).

When does dementia start and how long does it last? Dementia doesn’t start at any specific age but tends to occur almost exclusively in elderly people, after getting dementia in the adulthood or elderly stage of the lifespan, dementia will stay with the person indefinitely and continue to worsen until death.

How often does this illness occur in the human population? Statistics have shown that an estimated 298,000 Australians were effected by dementia in 2011, the majority (62%) of these people were women, the data collected also says that: of all Australians, 1 in 77 (1.3%) had dementia of all Australians aged 65 and over, 1 in 11 (9%) had dementia of all Australians aged 85 and over, 3 in 10 (30%) had dementia. (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare Canberra, 2011).

What are the risk factors of dementia? If someone has dementia, they could be in not only mental but also physical danger, one of if not THE most common symptom of dementia is memory loss, which could cause the person to loose items of value such as ID, phone, wallet, keys etc. dementia can also cause the person to not know where they are or think they are someone they shouldn’t be, this can occur at any time and since mainly elderly people have dementia, they could leave their house in the middle of the night and be injured or become lost. Another obvious and unavoidable risk of dementia is death. You could also pass down the illness to your children or grandchildren because it is hereditary. As you age you are more likely to get this illness.

What can be done to treat dementia? Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia both have no cure, but there are some ways to treat the side effects that come with the illness. As some side effects of Alzheimer’s particularly can effect the person physically, physical therapy and medicines can be used to lessen the effects. As far as the mental illness goes there is no cure.

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