Hot MedFax

First I didn't have to worry about it.  Now it seems I do. If you keep forgetting where your keys and glasses are, you just might, after all, have the beginnings of Alzheimer's . At least, that's what a new study is saying. According to newswise.com, new research by scientists at the University of Kentucky's Sanders-Brown Center on Aging suggests that people who notice their memory is slipping may be on to something.  The study appears to confirm that self-reported memory complaints are strong predictors of clinical memory impairment later in life. Researchers asked 531 people with an average age of 73 and free of dementia if they had noticed any changes in their memory in the prior year. The participants were also given annual memory and thinking tests for an average of 10 years. After death, participants' brains were examined for evidence of Alzheimer's disease. During the study, 56 percent of the participants reported changes in their memor...

You've seen them on TV.  The former pro football players looking confused and struggling to put a sentence together.  Or boxer Muhammad Ali with that blank look in his eyes. Researchers are slowly coming to the conclusion that, yes, repeated concussions may lead to Alzheimer's.  " A new study suggests that a history of concussion involving at least a momentary loss of consciousness may be related to the buildup of Alzheimer’s-associated plaques in the brain," newswise.com reports.   Study author Michelle Mielke, Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic researcher found, however that "i n people with a history of concussion, a difference in the amount of brain plaques was found only in those with memory and thinking problems, not in those who were cognitively normal." In the study, "o f the 448 people without any thinking or memory problems, 17 percent reported a brain injury and 18 percent of the 141 with memory and thinking difficulties reported a concussion or h...

If you know where this comes from ("Lost in Space," remember?), this epidemic applies to you. Listen all you Baby Boomers out there.  The next epidemic won't be measles or mumps.  Experts are predicting it will be Alzheimer's. That's because the disease primarily hits people in their 70's and older, and we're getting there.  A story at USA Today notes that by 2050, the affliction rate will have tripled, striking 1 in 85 people by this date.  (Of course, how many of us will be alive then?!) But it's something to think about, for our children.  Though doctors know how it develops, and now may be able to definitively diagnose it when we're still alive, no one knows why.   The symptoms are more than forgetting your keys, which I do all the time, or forgetting a word, like fork, which I also do.  Amnesia, the inability to communicate, difficulty with tasks, confusion about time or place, are all part of the disease. It's important to remembe...