Presentation Evaluation
“As many as 5.1 million Americans may have Alzheimer’s disease. “Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is an irreversible, progressive brain disease that slowly destroys memory and thinking skills, and eventually even the ability to carry out the simplest tasks.”(Alzheimer’s association, 2013). AD is the most common form of dementia and is not a normal part of aging. On average, after diagnosis the individual only lives up to 8 years longer.
Alzheimer’s disease symptoms vary from person to person and some of the symptoms may seem part of the aging process. Alzheimer’s disease may be present for years but the disease’s symptoms may present themselves after the age of 65. Many of the early behavioral changes include memory loss(especially recent events), poor judgment, confusion, mood changes such as increased anxiety, agitation, irritability, delusions, and struggle with normal routines or habits.(Alzheimer’s Associatation, 2013) In a study comparing the behavioral presentations of people with mild, moderate, and severe AD, apathy was found to be the most widespread behavior (Mega, Cummings, Fiorello, & Gornbein, 1996). This may be due decreased neural communication as a result of neurological damage “The plaques, or clumps of protein called beta-amyloid, may damage and destroy brain cells in several ways, including interfering with cell to cell communication” (“Mayo Clinic”, 2013). One theory on why AD is caused is due is the cholinergic hypothesis, which suggests that AD is caused by reduced synthesis of the neurotransmitter acetylcholine. Acetylcholine will break connections with other nerve cells and then die. Short-term memory failure in AD patients is due to the disease first destroying nerve cells in the hippocampus and then after nerve cells die in the cerebral cortex which results in decreased language and judgment. Hallmarks of the disease are “beta-amyloid plaques-sticky clumps of protein fragments and...