Alzheimer's disease is a memory loss disease which occurs to individuals due to the brain cell damages which hinders normal relay of impulses thus affecting the memory of a person. The disease is thought to be related to old age since most of the cases start from the age of 65. However, due to various factors, the disease has been on a minimal rate been affecting children from the age as low as one year. Various factors such as age, genders and genetics have also been a significant contributor to the development of the condition in many cases. A person affected by the disorder tends to forget event faster and also ends up losing some of their belongings anyhow because they cannot remember where they kept them. The impacts of the disease can significantly affect one' career, social life and also personal life. The intensity of the disorder has led to the establishment of many institutions around the world for taking care of the affected individuals since there is no known cure for the disease.
A) Etiology of the Disorder
Alzheimer's is dementia that damages brain cell leading to memory loss and other mental functions. The disorder is caused by a combination of genetics, environmental and lifestyle factors which manipulates the functioning of the brain over time. The major factor causing the disease is the presence of high levels of protein inside and outside of the brain cells compromising their normal functioning and communicating with each other effectively. The hypothalamus, which is responsible for learning and memory is often the first to be affected by the disease, making the memory loss the earlier symptoms of Alzheimer's. There is no known specific diagnosis for the disorder. However, doctors use various methods to determine whether one has the disease. For instance, the use of medical history can reveal the possibility of Alzheimer's infection. In the use of medical history in diagnosis, the doctor will inquire about current and past illnesses as well as the medication that one is currently taking. The doctor will also inquire about the history of the family members in regard to Alzheimer's or any other Demetria. The patient may also be required to do some mental abilities tests ( Rovelet-Lecrux, 2006 ). The second type of diagnosis can be the use of a brain scan. The doctor may recommend that a patient should undergo a brain scan to establish the brains cells structure to rule out the presence of Alzheimer's. Alzheimer's infected brain cells tend to be sunken due to the damages. This state affects a person's state of mind in terms of memory.
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Characteristics
According to literature, Alzheimer's mostly affects people from the age of but also depends on certain factors such as age, gender and also through genetic inheritance. Also, there is childhood Alzheimer's which mostly occurs due to genetic inheritance. The study shows that women are twice likely to develop Alzheimer's than men. This fact is however not fully explained but it is assumed that this is caused by the reduction of estrogen hormone as they approach the age of 65 years. From a YouTube video Battle against ‘Childhood Alzheimer's https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmSUOFVnGtY a little child with Alzheimer's be a real burden to the parents as they have to keep a close watch to the kid always. Also, the condition needs special medical attention in the effort to slow down the effect of the disease on the child.
In comparison between the literature and the videotaped observations, is that the disease seems to be more severe in children than adults. It makes it hard for a kid to grow well as their academic, social and mental developments are greatly affected.
In contrast, Alzheimer's in children is hard to detect because sometime you may think that they literally don't know something, but the fact is that they forgot about it due to the effects of the disease. In old ages, one may appear confused as they try to remember things whereby the disease can be detected, whereas in small chill it is a bit complex to establish whether the kid has really forgotten something or whether they know it at all.
A brief summary of the videotaped observations
The video features a 1year old kid who is still learning how to walk by herself. The parents have noticed some unusual development behaviors which the doctor says could be Alzheimer's symptoms. The child's condition leaves the parents with confusion as this is a very small kid to have the disease but they take it upon themselves to take care and provide medical attention for her to improve the condition.
B) Philosophical Approach
Many philosophers have debated on Alzheimer disease and they found that the physiopathology of Alzheimer disease. The physiopathology of Alzheimer disease is significant.
The risk factors for Alzheimer disease include age, family, and heredity plus other factors that might not be influenced by humans.
Alzheimer disease is tested for using two common tests, angiotensin and dilating blood vessels to lower blood pressure.
The pathophysiology of vascular dementia occurs in different forms such as confusion. Vision loss is another symptom. Disorientation and difficulty in speaking and understanding speech are other components. The risk factors associated with it include advancing age as it affects mainly the older people. Lifestyle may also be a risk factor as it involves things like smoking, lack of exercise, living a sedentary lifestyle and lack of a healthy diet.
The major difference between dementia and depression is that while dementia is a primarily a mental disorder, depression is more of a mood disorder. The symptoms of depression include sadness, panic, restlessness, boredom, too much or lack of sleep, exhaustion, excessive worry, suicidal thoughts and difficulty in coping up.
The three stages of Alzheimer are
Stage One Alzheimer's – Mild Alzheimer's Disease
Mild Alzheimer's disease is characterized by some memory loss of more recent events and impaired judgment and attention.
Stage Two Alzheimer's – Moderate Alzheimer's Disease
The symptoms of moderate Alzheimer's increasing problems with memory, logic, speech, and initiative, restlessness also becomes a problem leading to safety issues.
Stage Three Alzheimer's – Severe Alzheimer's Disease
Severe Alzheimer's disease is characterized by almost total memory loss. The person in this last stage of Alzheimer's usually needs help with all activities such as walking and even sitting.
Definition, and description learning and development characteristic of exceptional student
Alzheimer disease (AD) can be defined as a neurodegenerative disorder marked by a cognitive and behavioral impairment that significantly interferes with social and occupational functioning. It is an incurable disease with a long preclinical period and progressive course ( Rovelet-Lecrux, 2006 ). In the AD, plaques develop in the hippocampus, a structure deep in the brain that helps to encode memories, and in other areas of the cerebral cortex that are involved in thinking and making decisions. Alzheimer disease can or is significant and includes effects on three processes that keep neurons healthy. These processes include communication, metabolism and repair. Somebody suffering from this kind of disease results in certain nerves cells in the brain stops working, loses connection with other nerve cells and finally die. The destruction and death of these nerve cell cause memory failure, personality changes and problem in carrying out daily activities, these are some of the characteristics of Alzheimer Disease.
Teaching strategies/ intervention.
Some of the teaching strategies that can be observed by caregivers for someone suffering from Alzheimer disease include first and foremost understanding the behavior changes of the patient as this can help to reduce these difficulties. Secondly, the coping strategy can help the caregiver in attending to somebody suffering from Alzheimer disease. Some of the coping strategies include.
Setting realistic and attainable goals
By setting realistic and attainable goals, this helps the caregiver to put everything in the right direction and ensuring that everything is alright.
Enjoy the good times
This is another strategy that can be observed by the caregivers being that most patients suffering from AD will tend to remain physically fit and are able to retain their ability to be comfortable and later be involved in social situations.
Reminisce about the past
Reminiscing about the past will help the caregivers to engage in a couple of discussions and this always creates a good platform for both the patient and the caregiver. This can be achieved by engaging the patient with watching videos and sometimes reviewing travels from the past. This creates a good relationship between the patient and the caregiver and they continue to share their experiences and feelings.
Being flexible
The caregiver should be flexible having in mind that AD is a progressive disease and again that the patient symptoms will have to change as time goes. The caregiver can flexible in the sense that he can seek help, ask for advice and learn from other caregivers who had such an experience at one point in time.
Supervision
Frequent supervision can be recommended as a strategy being that the disease is a progressive disease. This takes into control the safety of the patient with the AD. As they become more forgetful as well as a decrease in their judgement. Frequent supervision will help maintain as much independence and autonomy as possible.
Assistive Technology
Patient Profile and Background Information
Sandra is an 18-year-old lady who presents to the clinic for a routine exam. Her teacher realized some changes in her and decide to take her for some checkups since she couldn't participate in class the way she used to. Alzheimer disease is tested for using tow common tests, the Mini-mental state exam (MMSE) and the Mini cog exam (MCE). During the MMSE, a health professional asks a patient a series of questions designed to test a range of everyday mental skills. Administration of the test takes between 5 and 10 minutes and examines functions including registration (repeating named prompts), attention and calculation, recall, language, ability to follow simple commands and orientation. The maximum MMSE score is 30 points. A score of 20 to 24 suggests mild dementia, 13 to 20 suggests moderate dementia, and less than 12 indicates severe dementia. On average, the MMSE score of a person with Alzheimer's declines about two to four points each year ( Yeager, 2010) . her teacher decided to look for her relatives back home where Sandra was coming from, and he found out that Sandra was staying with her aunt. When he shared with her aunt about Sandra's condition in class, her aunt told the teacher that Sandra was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease nine years ago when she started to display short-term memory loss. She was misplacing her glasses and keys. For example, she also had taken some walks around her neighborhood where she has resided for over 8 years and had gotten lost on more than one occasion.
Her neighbors and family had also noticed that Sandra was becoming quieter and passive. She was not as interested in participating in family outings or working in her garden, a past time she had enjoyed most of her teenage life. After the findings by the teacher through Sandra's aunt, the teacher decides to offer her some assistance by letting her take her classes from home. The teacher also decided to offer frequent supervision to assess her recovery process and this made him share a lot with Sandra. Her family could also have contributed greatly since her mother and father both died of Alzheimer disease. We can say it runs in the family. Heredity could also have played a big part in her condition. Since her mother also dies from the disease it could be argued that Sandra inherited it from her mother.
Physical Assessment and Diagnostic Data
However, she scored 25 out of a possible 30 points on the Mini-Mental Status exam. She was started on Aricept (donepezil) which helped with both her memory and mood for several years. Four years ago, family members and the teacher noticed another significant change in Sandra. Not only had previous manifestations become more severe, but she also began having difficulty with numbers, could no longer balance her chequebook. She could no longer solve a simple mathematical task that was given out as a homework in class. Because of these new symptoms, Sandra was retested for new systemic disease processes but no significant abnormalities were detected other than a mild case of iron deficiency anemia. A CT scan of the brain revealed moderate to severe cerebral atrophy in the temporal and parietal lobes bilaterally. Her Mini-Mental Status Examination (MMSE) score decreased to 18/30.
The aunt and the teacher decided to share caregiving responsibilities. Within the past six weeks, Sandra has begun to display multiple, sudden outbursts of anger. While shopping for groceries with her aunt, she became separated and lost from her aunt and began throwing tomatoes at the store manager who was trying to help her. It took 15 minutes to calm her down. She also began having occasional urinary accidents. Then aunt state that caring for Sandra is now becoming unmanageable and are considering seeking a long-term care facility for her.
Family history: both parents deceased. Father died at 45 from a CVA. Mother died from the AD at the age of 54. One brother died at the age of 12 from an MI. She has a sister who died of AD five years ago at the age of 13.
Social History: An orphan, does not smoke or drink alcohol.
Her regular medications include:
Aricept (donepezil)
Avapro (irbesartan)
Crestor (rosuvastatin)
One baby aspirin daily
In order to ensure that these children with the same problem are well taken care of in our community, a USA based aid has helped the community to develop and establish children home and well installed with caregivers. This aid has helped the community in creating awareness and educating people since Alzheimer is a progressive disease ( Yeager, 2010) . Some of the programs that have been put to help include
Early childhood engagement program
Online tools like live well online resources, virtual library and community resource finder.
These programs help in identifying what studies may be fit for you and help in participating in clinical research that helps in accelerating progress and provision of valuable insights into prevention mechanisms. In the application of NAEYC, i.e. ( Serve as an advocate for children, their families, and their teachers in community and society ) I would console the victims and their families while at the care center, and offer visits at their homes to give them hope and motivation to curb stigma and have a sense of belonging.
C) Social Implications
Worldwide, childhood Alzheimer's is not a common phenomenon in the world as it mostly affects seniors from the age of 65 years and above. For this reason, if any, facilities specifically for children are rare to find. For instance, in Lexington, Kentucky, the institution dealing with Alzheimer's are purposely for the seniors, although they can also be helpful in the case of childhood Alzheimer's. facilities such as Magnolia springs are of the example of a local program responsible for handling Alzheimer's cases in Lexington. Additionally, Child Development Centre (CDC) of the Bluegrass is another institution with a branch in Lexington which has a program that supports children with or without special need which would be of much use for children with Alzheimer's. Many articles have in the past been published on the matters regarding Alzheimer's disease. Online journals have been among the professional publication meant to sensitize the public about the disorder.
Stigmatization makes an individual feel less of a human even in the situations they had no control over. Alzheimer's cases have not been exceptional to stigmatization. especially in children with early childhood Alzheimer's, stigma can significantly affect their development due to stress and withdrawal state that comes with stigmatization. The society should understand that these children didn't develop the condition due to their own desires, it is a condition that anyone can acquire and the community should the basic unit to facilitate the victim to accept the condition and live with it positively. I would advocate for a positive attitude towards these cases by the general public as the sign of love could mean a lot to the victims of any condition.
References
Rovelet-Lecrux, A., Hannequin, D., Raux, G., Le Meur, N., Laquerrière, A., Vital, A., ... & Dubas, F. (2006). APP locus duplication causes autosomal dominant early-onset Alzheimer disease with cerebral amyloid angiopathy. Nature genetics, 38(1), 24.
Yeager, C. A., Hyer, L. A., Hobbs, B., & Coyne, A. C. (2010). Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia: the complex relationship between diagnosis and caregiver burden. Issues in Mental Health Nursing, 31(6), 376-384.
