Alzheimer’s is a common disease in aging that profoundly impacts more than 6 million individuals in the USA alone. However, there is hope.
New treatments are now available and being used to help patients, and researchers are working tirelessly to find even better therapies. There are also proactive steps you can implement starting in mid-adult life to lower your risk, even with a family history. Read below to learn more about measures you can take to understand the risk, prevention, and management of Alzheimer’s.
1. Recognize your risk.
Prevention can consider identifying and managing risk factors, such as vascular risk factors. For example, diabetes and hypertension are very common and associated with stroke, which itself can in turn lead to cognitive impairment and dementia. Women and some minority racial and ethnic groups carry a higher burden of dementia, compared to white men. Your healthcare team can help you identify these factors and provide guidance on your individualized screening needs, including what tests may be appropriate and what research shows promise for newly developed tests such as in blood.
2. Optimize lifestyle habits.
Many risk and protective factors are now recognized for dementia. Most protective factors are lifestyle factors such as regular exercise, a healthy diet, good sleep hygiene, and social and cognitive activities. Importantly, the benefits of prevention approaches appear to be most impactful if applied over many years, not just months or late in life when a person is already experiencing memory loss.
3. Pay attention to lapses in memory.
The most commonly observed early clinical feature suggesting that someone may be developing symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease, is a new memory problem. Often, the patient, or a person close to the patient, may notice a gradual worsening of memory function over many months or a year or two, and the thinking problem progresses to affect one’s ability to function in day-to-day activities. For example, common symptoms are forgetting conversations, asking the same question repeatedly on the same day, or relying on reminders more than usual. If you start to notice these signs in yourself or a loved one, speak with your provider or reach out to Summus.
4. Ask your provider about all treatment options.
Don’t hesitate to have a discussion with your provider about all treatment options, including recent research findings in human studies such as clinical trials. While reversing some degree of cognitive impairment is on the horizon, the actual prevention of the clinical expression of Alzheimer’s disease at the population level is the holy grail in dementia research and care, and we are likely still years off from this target. In the meantime, several disease-modifying therapies, specifically anti-amyloid therapies, have received approval from the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the treatment of the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s disease, and are already being used clinically for select patients. The landscape of treatment for dementia is rapidly changing and there is hope for finding a cure that not only slows the disease, but may reverse it, or one day, prevent it altogether.
5. Know you are not alone.
If you or someone you know is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s, know there is help. You can reach out to leaders in your community, utilize local resources, the Alzheimer’s Association local chapter, your healthcare team, and Summus. A comprehensive management plan, with medication and non-medication approaches, can be developed to be tailored to your specific situation and needs.
If you have questions about Alzheimer’s, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Log in to your Summus dashboard to get started.