This disease has become the most discussed of all types of dementia. If you Watched a person with Alzheimer’s, you will see a gradual decay in their ability to remember especially with 10 percent of the population over 65 year’s old suffering from the disorder.

Alois Alzheimer a German physician first discovered the disease back in 1906 but it has only really been in the world’s focus for just over 30 years. Studies show that your greatest risk of acquiring Alzheimer’s is advancing age. The problem of early diagnosis is often down to the sufferer, who refuses to admit that anything is wrong even when they start to experience some of the symptoms.

Alzheimer’s disease is currently treated exactly the same as other forms of dementia. Unfortunately, because there is still so much that is unknown about the disease, there is no definite way to treat it although some symptoms can be improved or slowed down with drugs. They have been shown to help the average Alzheimer’s disease sufferer cognitive abilities by up to six months.

A new drug, Memantine is helping to slow down the deterioration process during the later stages and is a derivative of the well known anti-influenza drug Amantadine. Fortunately, Memantine has few side effects as 80 percent of the drug is passed in urine unchanged and so far it is the only drug that has proved to be of real benefit to patients with moderate to severe symptoms.

This disease is now the fourth largest cause of death in America. Although contracting the disease is a tragedy, the cost of treatment and care for sufferers is causing economic vibrations. Last year the National Institute on Aging spent half of its annual budget on research into age related disease, they are now testing over three hundred compounds at any one time.

To help you reduce the chance of contracting dementia, it’s important to adopt a healthy lifestyle, choose carefully what you eat and drink and take more exercise. Although not full proven yet, researchers studying Alzheimer’s patients have noticed that those who stay healthy and cheerful have slowed down the rate of decline. This disease is still almost exclusively and aging condition and incidences of younger victims are rare.