Dr. Majid Fotuhi

coming up next on passion struck as a neurologist specializing in memory and alzheimer's disease i've seen thousands of patients with different levels of memory problems concussion related problems different forms of dementia i know this field really inside and out and what i've seen over and over again that many of these older people who have memory problems can be much sharper

In my clinic, we had 25 brain coaches, people who helped to incorporate these five pillars of brain health, which we will discuss shortly, into their lives and address the treatable parts.

Like we were just talking about how depression is a treatable component of when somebody develops Alzheimer's disease.

I'm fine.

Thank you very much for inviting me, John.

Dementia is a clinical syndrome.

It can have many different causes and it means that a person has had significant cognitive decline to the point that they cannot function independently.

So for example, a patient with dementia may not be able to remember names of their children or to get lost in their own neighborhood or have significant behavioral changes.

And dementia could be due to Parkinson's disease or strokes, or it could be due to too much alcohol or too many concussions.

It's a broad term that says somebody has had brain problems to the point they can't live by themselves anymore.

Alzheimer's disease is a subset of dementia.

For example, dementia may cause difficulty with walking as well as

memory problems, but Alzheimer's disease affects primarily memory and cognitive abilities.

Early in the stages of Alzheimer's disease, a person may ask the same question multiple times.

There's a condition called mild cognitive impairment characterized by repeating something like five, 10 times and forgetting that you had to see the answer.

Alzheimer's disease is characterized by too many plaques and tangles in the brain.

These plaques and tangles are collections of proteins that have aggregated and become toxic and they cause brain to shrink.

Alzheimer's disease usually causes memory problems more so than other brain related issues.

That's a good example of vascular dementia.

Vascular dementia happens when a person has multiple strokes and somebody who has a congestive heart failure has difficulty with supplying the brain with the blood flow that's need.