{"id":900,"date":"2016-10-04T00:01:57","date_gmt":"2016-10-03T14:01:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/theageofsenescence.com\/?p=900"},"modified":"2025-02-20T21:26:19","modified_gmt":"2025-02-20T10:26:19","slug":"difference-between-dementia-and-alzheimers-disease","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/?p=900","title":{"rendered":"What is the difference between dementia and Alzheimer\u2019s Disease?"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2>\u00a0<\/h2>\n<h4 style=\"text-align: center;\"><em>\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/theageofsenescence.com\/who-is-the-age-of-senescence\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Kirsty Porter<\/a><br \/>3 October<\/em>\u00a02016<\/h4>\n<p>Dementia is an umbrella term used to describe symptoms of a degenerative brain disease. Dementia is to Alzheimer\u2019s what fruit is to an apple or what shortness of breath is to Asthma.<\/p>\n<p>Dementia is a <strong>disease symptom<\/strong> and while it more commonly affects the older adult it is NOT a natural part of ageing.<\/p>\n<p>Alzheimer\u2019s is the most common of all the dementias and affects up to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.fightdementia.org.au\/about-dementia\/types-of-dementia\/alzheimers-disease\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">70%\u00a0of people diagnosed<\/a>. \u00a0Dementia with <a style=\"color: #0000ff;\" href=\"https:\/\/www.lbda.org\/category\/3437\/what-is-lbd.htm\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Lewy Bodies<\/a> is another\u00a0form of\u00a0dementia but it is widely regarded as the most under-diagnosed dementia, as was<a style=\"color: #0000ff;\" href=\"http:\/\/qz.com\/798443\/robin-williams-suffered-from-dementia-with-lewy-bodies-a-widely-under-diagnosed-condition\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"> the case with actor Robin Williams<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Dementia describes the symptoms of all degenerative brain diseases. Its symptoms can be as varied and as wide-ranging as our own personalities but generally dementia is characterised by changes in; behaviour, memory, orientation, movement, mood or ability to make decisions.<\/p>\n<p>Finding out the cause of dementia symptoms requires a combination of specialist doctors to crawl into the nether regions of the brain to establish which part of the brain is affected to determine the correct diagnosis. For more on how a diagnosis is formed\u00a0check out\u00a0<a style=\"color: #0000ff;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.nhs.uk\/Conditions\/dementia-guide\/Pages\/dementia-diagnosis-tests.aspx\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">this guide<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe data-src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/RT907zjpZUM?feature=oembed\" width=\"700\" height=\"394\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" src=\"about:blank\" class=\"lazyload\" data-load-mode=\"0\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>This brain sojourn takes time. But, once the specialist doctor discovers <em>where<\/em> the dementia is occurring, <em>how <\/em>it\u2019s progressing and even <em>why<\/em>, action can be taken and in some cases, specialists can even reverse the problem. \u00a0For example, certain conditions such as depression or an under-active thyroid can be the cause of dementia symptoms, and therefore it\u2019s important to establish early on what type of dementia is presenting in the brain.<\/p>\n<h2>And then there are the \u2018true\u2019 dementias<\/h2>\n<p>I would love to\u00a0add a, \u201cdementia-can-be-reversed-if-you-get-help-early\u201d heading, but sadly, in this day and age, it\u2019s not the case.<\/p>\n<p>&#8216;True\u2019 dementias describe irreversible and progressive degenerative areas of the brain that are presently incurable and are terminal. \u00a0 Further, there are no cures or medication that can stop the degeneration or progression of any of the \u2019true\u2019 dementias.<\/p>\n<p>Degenerative true dementias, such as the more common ones; Alzheimer\u2019s Disease, Lewy Bodies or Parkinson&#8217;s Disease, are all hallmarked by their own set of pathological changes in different areas and different cells of the brain.<\/p>\n<p>As these pathological changes become more progressive, the brain begins to atrophy or shrink. Naturally, brain atrophy will affect physiological behaviours such as speech, movement, memory and perception. \u00a0Importantly, with a prognosis anywhere between a 6 months (Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease or\u00a0\u201cmad-cow\u201d disease) and 20 years (Alzheimer\u2019s), getting the correct diagnosis will kick-start appropriate support, expectations and choices.<\/p>\n<p>Today, there are over 130 different types of dementia recorded. With these kinds of numbers, it is important to get the correct diagnosis so that the plan of care and action is\u00a0appropriate to the disease trajectory.<\/p>\n<p>While diagnosis is important to establish disease trajectory, it is also vital that a great deal of support from health care professionals, the community associations, family and friends become a fundamental response at this point. Sadly, it is also at this point, <a style=\"color: #0000ff;\" href=\"http:\/\/theageofsenescence.com\/gene-wilder-stigma-a-childs-smile\/\">stigma<\/a>\u00a0\u00a0and ignorance becomes as real as the fear and emotional devastation a dementia diagnosis can bring.<\/p>\n<p>This week, while setting up my own dementia caf\u00e9 (<a href=\"http:\/\/theageofsenescence.com\/dementiacafe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">The Umbrella Dementia Caf\u00e9 <\/a>and on <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/TheUmbrellaDementiaCafe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Facebook<\/a>), I\u2019ve heard different perspectives of \u2018what is dementia\u2019, and why some people get Alzheimer\u2019s in families and others don\u2019t. I\u2019d be interested in hearing what you\u2019ve heard about dementia or Alzheimer\u2019s? Why do some people get it early and others later in life?<\/p>\n<p>Brian Kursonis, from North Carolina in the US, did not count on having Alzheimer\u2019s at 54 at all! On the issue of stigma and ignorance he\u00a0says,<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;I have to tell you though, for me the stigma or the &#8216;uncomfortable part&#8217; isn&#8217;t just admitting I have dementia to people but doing it so openly that <em>they<\/em> sometimes feel uncomfortable. I love it though when I can educate them. \u00a0I knew so little about dementia a year ago\u201d.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p><strong>Written By Kirsty Porter<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dementia is an umbrella term used to describe symptoms of a degenerative brain disease. Dementia is to Alzheimer\u2019s what fruit is to an apple or what shortness of breath is to Asthma.\t\t<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10766,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"image","meta":{"wds_primary_category":133,"footnotes":""},"categories":[133],"tags":[85,74,95,96,77,103,104,98,105,106,102,107],"class_list":["post-900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-image","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-helpful-resources","tag-aged-care","tag-alzheimers","tag-awareness","tag-cafe","tag-dementia","tag-diagnosis","tag-education-awareness","tag-fear","tag-lewy-bodies","tag-robin-williams","tag-stigma","tag-umbrella-dementia-cafe","post_format-post-format-image"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/umbrelladementiacafes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}