Mr. Sen’s was the most admired professor at shantiniketan university. The reason was his ability to mix will all ages of people. He used to not only teach students but used to share lunch with them in student’s canteen, he had even danced in the college fest…… but now he is retired and he stay with a domestic help in a small rented house. His family has abandoned him….. he had been forgetting …. Forgetting his name, whether he had morning breakfast or not, whether he read newspaper in the morning or not……. And one day he left his house complaining that his wife willfully does not give him food to eat.
We all tend to forget small thing in daily life and we take it as normal….but sometimes it can be starting of alzimer particularly if you are 60 years and above. The most common symptoms are people forgetting their name,the way to go home, how to dial a number, cannot recall if he has taken bath or breakfast.
In India we have some 6-8% old people above 60 years of age who have alzimer. Women are more prone than men. This disease has been identified in 1906 by Dr Eloik alzimer. He studied old people on a prolonged basis and found that this starts with short term memory loss which gradually leads to hallucinations , depression, anxiety and insecurity. In extreme cases the patient may become mad.
He studied the brain of alzimer patients and found that the brain tissues of such patient get entangled and thus they have memory loss. Recent studies have found that this need not be an old age problem only. It can happen to anyone. Sometimes it happens due to any accident, high fever, lack of nutrient over a prolonged period of time, reaction of any medicine, increase exposure to aluminum or deficiency of neurotransmeter like acitilecline.
Alzimer patient slowly starts forgetting the daily routine work, cannot remember where they have kept a particular thing or how to go home. They find difficulty in understanding and remembering new things. They hear strange voice and become irritated and complaining and this make their social relation worse. People start avoiding them and the person start feeling lonely.
This can be treated with patience. It is advised to take such patients to psychologist and go for complete course of medication. The family play an very important role not only in providing mental and physical support but also making sure that the patients get his or her medicines regularly….. Remember they tend to forget taking medicine.
