alzheimer's disease epidemic…

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aged nervous tissue, alzheimer's disease, he was having trouble at work, couldn't remember certain things, "things just seemed to fall into place", diagnosis, says his wife, della, "conversations, him that were originally confusing to me, made sense", today, della frazier rios serves, director of education, training, alzheimer's association-nyc chapter, 4.5 million people, have alzheimer's disease, in the next few decades, number is expected to skyrocket by 350%, america's baby-boomers age, "that, astronomical leap", says danielle gray, ph, d, a neuroscientist at emory university in atlanta who studies cognitive decline, "it's why we, mounting a great deal of collaborative efforts to, something, illness", in 2002, alzheimer's association, peter d, hart research associates conducted a survey, among the findings, 95% of americans say alzheimer's disease, serious health threat, 57% worry they'll get the disease, 68% believed more funding is needed to help treat, prevent alzheimer's, than four in 10 americans know someone, alzheimer's, nearly 1 in 5 has someone in family, no cure, alzheimer's disease, several medications now available, , aricept, razadyne, formerly reminyl, namenda, improve cognitive, behavioral symptoms, earliest symptoms, memory difficulties, abstract thinking, vague, tough to pinpoint, researchers admit the key to developing better treatments, thorough understanding of what leads to alzheimer's, overall ability to diagnose it earlier, currently, an "official" diagnose of alzheimer's is made by ruling out other possible causes, the cognitive decline, early hints, research published, in the journal neuropsychology suggests that simple neuropsychological tests could be, detect alzheimer's, typical symptoms appear, mark jacobson, a research psychologist, veterans affairs, va, san diego healthcare system, says cognitive profiling combined, known changes in memory loss, identify people who, in the early stages, the study, jacobson, his colleagues, va, california at san diego, ucsd, recruited 20 normal elderly individuals, 20 potential alzheimer's patients who showed little, no clinical signs, 40 veterans participated in 2 neuropsychological tests, 1 focusing on verbal naming ability, another to test visual-spatial skills, groups were split evenly in terms of those who excelled verbally, superior spatial skills, "we found that the elderly patients who later developed alzheimer's showed an asymmetric pattern, unchanges, in cognitive test results several years, diagnosis", says jacobson, the study's authors, jacobson's team is also using a special mri procedure, functional neuroimaging to record changes in brain blood flow in an attempt to learn whether the cognitive performance differences reflect anatomical, functional changes in brain function, structure, elsewhere, in the country, researchers, studying the association between apolipoprotein e, apoe, a gene that helps metabolize cholesterol, risk of alzheimer's disease, healthy middle-aged adults who carry a variation, the gene have difficulties in spatial attention, working memory similar to those clinically diagnosed, alzheimer's, don't forget, help is out, patients, families who need support, interested in learning, alzheimer's disease clinical trials, national alzheimer's association at 1-800-272-3900, jacobson mw, delis dc, bondi, mw, salmon dp, neuropsychological tests detect preclinical alzheimer's disease, individual-test versus cognitive-discrepancy score analyses, neuropsychology, 2002 apr vol 16(2), 132-139, hebert le, scherr pa, bienias jl, bennett da, evans da, alzheimer disease, population, prevalence estimates using the 2000 census, arch, neurol, august 2003, 60(8), 1119-1122.