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Alzheimer’s Disease Assignment

   

Added on  2021-05-21

4 Pages1441 Words17 Views
Alzheimer’s Disease: Risk Factors, Prevalence, Treatment and prevention and Economic and Social impactsWhat is Alzheimer’s Disease?Alzheimer’s disease commonly abbreviated as AD is a kind of dementia that brings aboutmemory loss, reasoning, behavior and thinking problems such that it affects the an individual’s daily lifestyle. At the early stage of the disease, the symptoms are usually manageable and unnoticeable but as it progresses it becomes worse. Alzheimer’s disease is progressive brain disease and it happens to be one of those diseases that are irreversible. The causes of the disease has not been fully identified however most research by scientist indicate that the causes could be a combination of environmental, genetic and lifestyle factors. The most common symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease is short memory loss or the lack of ability to remember information more so the newly learned information, significant changes in one’s behavior and mood and deepening confusion about time, events and place. For the longest time Alzheimer’s disease has been associated with old age however that isnot the case because the disease also affects the younger people and this is referred to as early onset Alzheimer’s. Those who get the early onset Alzheimer’s are usually between 40 to 50 years of age. The knowledge of Alzheimer’s in the society is so little such that people do not know what to expect or how to deal with it. It is important to have knowledge about the disease because it will help one in making important decisions such as choosing a healthy lifestyle and planning for the future. Causes and Risk Factors of Alzheimer’s DiseaseScientist have come to a conclusion that Alzheimer’s does not have a single cause but canbe caused by various factors such as lifestyle, genetics and environmental factors. There are

however other factors that researchers have identified to increase the risks of this disease. Some of these factors cannot be changed such as age, heredity and family history. However there other factors other than these that influences the Alzheimer’s disease. Age increase happens to be greatest risk factor for the Alzheimer’s disease and any other type of dementia in Kenya. However it is important to note that despite the fact that the risk of Alzheimer’s is increased by age, it not a direct cause of the disease. Alzheimer’s mostly affects those above 65 years and at after this age, the risk becomes more severe every five years. Research have indicated that genes are among the causes of Alzheimer’s. There are two types of genes that determines whether one develops Alzheimer’s or any other kind of disease and they include deterministic genes and risk genes. Risk genes are those that increase the risk of a disease development and deterministic genes are those that cause a disease. Alzheimer’s cases caused by deterministic genes is less than 1%. Family history is another strong risk factor of Alzheimer’s. Persons who are more likely to develop the Alzheimer’s disease are those who have family members with Alzheimer’s disease. The more thefamily members that have the disease the more the risk. Other risk factors that influence the Alzheimer’s are head injury from accidents and sports, the heart-head connection and the overall healthy aging. The brain health is highly dependent on the heart health because the nourishment of the brain is done by blood vessels and blood is pumped through the blood vessels by the heart.Prevalence of Alzheimer’s Disease by DemographicsThere is very limited information on Alzheimer’s disease in Kenya and much of the information available is outdated. However the prevalence of Alzheimer’s disease in Africa is reported to start from at least the age of 50 years and above. Records shows that the more the years the higher the growth of Alzheimer’s dementia and other vascular dementia. Particularly

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