Dementia is not a disease, it’s a syndrome. Its symptoms are common to brain disease. Dementia describes a set of symptoms that include memory loss, difficulty in thinking or problem solving and remembering things and language. This can be caused when the brain is damaged by Alzheimer disease or because of simple old age.
Symptoms of dementia:
If you are suffering from memory problems, don’t immediately conclude that it’s dementia. A person needs to have at least the two to three types of impairment in their daily life to confirm it, such as;
- Forgetting how to talk properly is the main symptom of memory loss due to aging. A person with the condition may have difficulty in finding the right word or to explain something to the other person. It may take a long time to conclude the conversation.
- Short –term memory loss can be an early indication of dementia. An older person can remember an incident that took place years ago but can’t remember what they had for lunch or breakfast.
- Communication is an early symptom of dementia. Mostly in case of older people, difficulty comes in finding the right word as well as communicating their thoughts.
- A person who suffers from dementia, their way of thinking changes, their mood changes they may be frustrated, irritated, unusually upset and sad because most of the times they can’t remember things which happened a few minutes back.
- A person with memory loss becomes confused about their whereabouts and sometimes forgets the date or the time of the day.
- Repetition is general in memory loss because of changes in the behavior. A person may repeat the same word over and over again or he may repeat his daily task.
Causes of Dementia:
- Depression, anxiety and stress
- Side effects of a particular kind of drug
- Vitamin deficiencies
- Excessive use of alcohol
- Blockage in heart
- Lack of proteins in body
Treatment:
Dementia can’t be treated accurately through medicines. There are many non-drug treatments available that can treat and help you to live a healthy life with the condition:
- Counseling is the best way to treat loss of memory.
Talking therapy and other behavioral therapies will help because older people wants to share their thoughts with other people.Regular activities include listening to music, singing, take part in different activities, reading books that will help to keep you physically and mentally active. - Exercise on a daily basis will help to lower the risk of this disease.
Memory loss can also be treated by medicines, it can stop them progressing for a while. - Drugs may temporarily stop the progress of dementia but if one stop taking medicines, the problems will start again. Counseling can help one to stop the progress permanently and decreases the rate of progress of the disease.
http://www.healthline.com/health/dementia/early-warning-signs#overview1
http://www.alz.org/what-is-dementia.asp
http://www.healthline.com/health/dementia/early-warning-signs#symptoms
https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/info/20007/types_of_dementia/1/what_is_dementia/7
