In very simple terms, senile dementia is the brain losing its abilities as changes occur inside it. The degree of loss determines how bad the dementia can be. Unfortunately, in many instances, this loss is manifested in many changes in the person’s life – changes for the worse and so it has a very sad impact on his or her life as well as everyone around.
First and foremost, not all people who age go through senile dementia. While there is always some wear and tear on the brain with the passing of the years, not everyone suffers from all the symptoms of senile dementia and many go to their grave with their brains functioning well right up to the last minute. So let’s take a look at what constitutes senile dementia.
One of the main symptoms of senile dementia is memory loss and very often it is the short term memory that is affected. While certain incidents from the past way back will be remembered, what happened yesterday or maybe even a few minutes ago will be forgotten. What is also obvious is that these people who suffer from this degeneration of the brain might not be so particular about their cleanliness, their dressing or their food habits anymore. They also find it difficult to recognize people and places and can get very irritable when reminded about things. In extreme cases, they can get very depressed and can suffer from mood swings. One thing that will also be noticed is that they fumble for words and forget the names of people or things without forgetting who they are and what they are used for.
The main cause of dementia is the loss of communication between certain brain cells and this could be due to a number of factors among them, the death of certain nerve cells. There are various types of dementia and all of them have their own list of symptoms. Alzheimer’s is just one of the many types of senile dementia. Alzheimer’s and senile dementia caused by a stroke number among the two main types of senile dementia. Some of them are caused due to certain growths or inclusions in the brain which contain a certain strain of proteins that seems to act unfavorably in the brain’s environment. In many cases, the propensity to senile dementia is inherited as a genetic trait and is very often compounded by the stress of modern life, pollution and other factors.
There are certain symptoms that one might think could be dementia but which are not. These are age-related cognitive changes which are a natural process of aging. This is just a decrease in the brain’s activity – not a change and while here too there could be memory loss and other symptoms, the onset is slow and it is a natural progression. So senile dementia needs to be diagnosed by doctors and they will do this by ruling out any conditions that could be treated like depression for example. Sometimes, the brain’s functions slow down due to a lack of nutrients, particularly Vitamin B12 and this can be put right with the necessary supplements. The main thing is to go and get the right diagnosis so the condition can be treated quickly and treated right.