Alzheimers Disease | Life With Problems

Alzheimer Association

By admin on Saturday, November 8th, 2008 | 2 Comments

Alzheimer Association

On April 10, 1980, the Alzheimer’s Disease and Related Disorders Association was incorporated. With no more than $75,000 for a budget, this Alzheimer Association made it under the leadership of founding president, Jerome Stone, opening seven founding chapters in total: Boston, Columbus, Minneapolis, New York City, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, and Seattle.

At that time, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) invested only $13 million in Alzheimer research. However, two years later in 1982, President Ronald Reagan designated the first National Alzheimer’s Disease Awareness Week. The Alzheimer Association founded more chapters after that and started its own research program. A testament: Things were finally beginning to happen.

A Multimillion Dollar Organization Dedicated to Alzheimer Research

Today, the Alzheimer Association is a multimillion dollar organization run by volunteers and dedicated individuals whose vision is to see “a world without Alzheimer’s disease.” And with their mission “to eliminate Alzheimer’s disease through the advancement of research; to provide and enhance care and support for all affected; and to reduce the risk of dementia through the promotion of brain health,” the Alzheimer Association has indeed come a long way from its humble beginnings.

Being the first and largest voluntary health organization dedicated to finding prevention methods, treatments, and an eventual cure for Alzheimer’s disease, the Alzheimer Association has been acting as a catalyst for a generation’s worth of advancements in the research revolving around Alzheimer’s as well as general health care and support.

Services for Free

25 years since its inception, the Alzheimer Association remains a donor supported and not for profit voluntary organization that provides reliable information and care consultation to Alzheimer’s patients, friends and family members. The supportive services they provide and special programs designed for patient’s loved ones have helped many a family cope with the disease. Moreover, the Alzheimer Association’s active role in public policy changes has brought on an increase in funding for dementia research, particularly its most common form, Alzheimer’s disease.

The Alzheimer Association now has nationwide distribution of local chapters with no less than 300 points of service. They provide you with support, whether you are a patient, a family member, or even a caregiver. In addition, the Alzheimer Association also offers education and training programs to care providers. These programs will help them deliver better dementia care and improve quality of life for people living with Alzheimer’s.

Core Programs and Services

Each of the local chapters of the Alzheimer Association provides the following core services:

* Information and Referral – a chapter helpline that is open 24/7, providing emotional support and information
* Care Consultation – dedicated professional staff help you navigate through the difficult decisions and uncertainties you may have in dealing with Alzheimer’s
* Support Group – peer or professionally led groups for caregivers
* Safety Services – Promoting and encouraging people with Alzheimer’s to enroll in their national Safe Return program

Alois Alzheimer

By admin on Friday, November 7th, 2008 | No Comments

Alois Alzheimer

Alois Alzheimer. You may have heard of him. His name certainly occupies a top spot, being as it is attached to one of the most puzzling diseases to hit man.

It was in 1906 that the first neuropathologist identified the symptoms of what is now known as Alzheimer’s disease. That man, of course, is Alois Alzheimer, 42 at the time and working with Emile Kraepelin, the “Linnaeus of psychiatry” for close to four years. But if we were to dissect the works of this cigar-touting genius, it is imperative that we also take a look at the man.

Alzheimer, the Man and the Genius

Alois Alzheimer describes his professional life in his curriculum vitae, written in Munich in 1903, as follows: “The undersigned, Dr. med. Alois Alzheimer, Catholic, born at Marktbreit in Bavaria on the 14th of June 1864 as son of the Royal notary, Eduard Alzheimer, attended the elementary school at Marktbeit, the Gymnasium at Aschaffenburg and the Universities of Berlin, Tübingen and Würzburg.” In 1894, he married Cecilie Geisenheimer neé Wallerstein in Frankfurt.

A year after receiving his medical degree in 1887, Alois Alzheimer spent a total of five months accompanying mentally ill women on a journey, after which he joined the staff of the city mental asylum in Frankfurt am Main – the Städtische Irrenanstalt, which was headed by Emil Sioli. It was here that Alzheimer learned more about psychiatry, as well as neuropathology, which became a great interest of his.

One year later, the distinguished neurologist, Franz Nissl joined Sioli’s staff as second physician, and it was not soon after that he and Alois Alzheimer worked on an extensive investigation of the pathology of the nervous system. Their study focused in particular on the normal and pathological anatomy of the cerebral cortex. Their findings were later published between 1906-1918 in a 6-volume book called the Histologische und histopatologische Arbeiten über die Grosshirnrinde (Histologic and Histopathologic Studies of the Cerebral Cortex).

Nissl moved on to work with Kraepelin, the leading German psychiatrist at the time, in Heidelberg while Alois Alzheimer continued his research on a wide range of subjects, but this time as director of the Irrenanstalt in 1895.

Then, in 1906, Auguste Deter, a 55-year old woman whom Alois Alzheimer first met in 1901 as his patient, died. Alzheimer was working in Munich at the time but when he received the news, he asked his previous chief Sioli to get access to the records and brain of Auguste D. Later, in November of that same year, at a meeting of the South-West German Society of Alienists, he would describe the clinical and neuropathological features of Auguste D as “eine eigenartige Erkrankung der Hirnrinde” (a peculiar disease of the cerebral cortex). The disease later came to be known as simply “Alzheimer’s disease,” after the man who discovered it.

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