Wanda W. Jones
Webster University
Literature Review Alzheimer’s disease is the decline of mental function and the most common form of dementia (Parsa, 2011). Dementia is a term used to describe multiple areas of functions that have progressive declines, such as “decline in memory, reasoning, communication skills, and the ability to carry out daily activities” (Banerjee, 2012, p. 706). Banerjee (2012) further explains that in conjunction with those declines, and at any point of the disease, individuals with dementias could develop symptoms of behavioral and psychological troubles such as “depression, psychosis, aggression, and wandering, causing problems in themselves, [and] complicate care” (p. 706).
In 1907, Alzheimer’s disease was named after a German neuropathologist named Alois Alzheimer, who first described the neuropathological features of this progressive disease that includes intellectual function loss and memory deterioration (Solmaz & Tastan, 2012, p. 289). The disease follows the path of “progressive deterioration comprised of gradual destruction of memory, judgment, language, reasons in addition to behavioral alterations” (Parsa, 2011, p. 100).
The major dementias include “Alzheimer’s disease, vascular dementia, mixtures of these two pathologies (mixed dementia) and rarer types such as Lewy body dementia, dementia in Parkinson’s disease and frontotemoporal dementia” (Banerjee, 2012, p. 706). Terms used by the public to describe dementia includes “’Alzheimer’s’, ‘dementia’, ‘senile’ and ‘crazy’”, with euphemisms “’senior moment’, ‘old timer’s disease’” and ‘slow thinking’ (Laditka S. B., et al., 2013, p. 369). Primarily, ‘Alzheimer’s disease’ is the term used to describe all types of dementia (Banerjee, 2012). According to The Alzheimer’s Association (2013), approximately 60-80% dementia cases are classified as Alzheimer’s
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