Differences between Dementia and Alzheimer’s
Every person in his life has a chance of 20% to become demented. Withe the baby-boom generation coming to age, this will become a big problem in the near future. Although this is almost the most frequent disease there is, there is a lot of confusion about what exactly dementia is and what the differences are with Alzheimer.
What are the differences between Dementia and Alzheimer's? This is a question many caregivers ask their psychologist when their loved ones are struck with this syndrome. Dementia is the deterioration of the mind that causes cognitive deficits on a variety of facets of the mind. It hits our memory function the most and especially the short term memory. It starts with forgetting where they put their wallet or key, but in the end they have troubles remembering their own name and names of their family. Dementia does not only affect our memory, it also affects our orientation, motor skills, planning and flexibility skills and much more.
The most common form of Dementia is Alzheimer disease. Alzheimer's takes care for 70% of all people that are demented. That means that 30% with dementia does not have Alzheimer's. The difference between dementia and alzheimer's is that Dementia is a syndrome: It is a state of mind where our cognition is not functioning as it should be and this impacts our entire life. There are many causes of dementia and Alzheimer disease is only one cause.
So what about the other 30% that does not has Alzheimers? As said before, there are more causes for dementia. The most common ones are: lewy body dementia, Vascular dementia, Parkinson Dementia and Pick's disease. All diseases come with other symptoms and therefore not one person who is demented is alike another one.
The differences sometimes make it hard to cope with this syndrome for caregivers. They often want answers like 'how long this' and 'how long before that'. There is no straight answer to these questions as it will affect everyone in a different way. Some people will deteriorate very rapidly while others decline in cognitive functioning very slowly.
So the differences between dementia and Alzheimer's are that Alzheimer's is a disease and this disease will eventually cause dementia. This does not work the other way around. It is important to know that not every person who is demented has Alzheimer's. There are many more possible causes and it is important to find out which one it is.
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