Dementia: how many years live? Dementia in the elderly: signs, stages of development and types of disease

In old age many people have disorders of thinking, memory, intellect and speech, provoked by changes in molecular metabolism between cells in the cerebral cortex caused by different causes. And the more pronounced these changes, the more severe is the senile dementia, called in medicine by dementia. An elderly person loses not only the available knowledge, experience, ability to learn, but also his own personality.

About that, as a result of which there is dementia, how many years live with this diagnosis, and how different types of this pathology look, we will talk further in the article.

Classification of dementia

Noticing that the elderly person living next to him, changing habits, character and ability to communicate, relatives are beginning to worry, afraid of the worst case scenario - total dementia, which, as a rule, is a harbinger of the near death of a native person. Is it so? How fast is aging of the brain?

To understand this, it is necessary to determine with which type of dementia it was necessary to encounter. In medicine, there are different classifications of this pathology. And since it is not an independent disease, then, depending on the underlying problem that caused it, the following types of dementia share:

• Atrophic appearance of the disease (provoked by Alzheimer's or Peak's disease), which occurs against the background of the initial degenerative reactions occurring in the cells of the central nervous system.
• Vascular, caused by atherosclerosis and hypertension. It occurs in connection with a violation of blood circulation in the brain.
• Mixed type - the development of this pathology has mechanisms that are similar to both atrophic and vascular.

Causes of dementia

The described problems can begin their destructive effect both as a result of the natural aging process of the organism, as well as due to internal diseases, thyroid gland ailments, neurological and vascular pathologies (such as ischemia, arterial hypertension, atherosclerosis, etc.).

Intoxication with alcohol or drugs can also push the body to pathological changes. The destructive effect also has a chronic poisoning by toxic chemical compounds in the industry.

Strokes, tumors and head injuries are also capable of breaking neural connections that will eventually lead to dementia.

However, cases are recorded where the causes of dementia are not in the process of natural aging or listed diseases, but in the intake of medicines. In such cases, the process is reversible, if you limit the amount or cancel such drugs.

Dementia due to Alzheimer's disease

Most often, the causes that cause the development of senile dementia are hidden in the organic damage of those areas of the brain that are responsible for the thinking and memory of a person. And the most common among them is dementia of Alzheimer's, that is, dementia that arose as a result of degenerative processes in neurons and the destruction of synaptic connections.

During this disease, amyloid (protein) plaques are formed on the nerve cells of the patient's brain, as well as neurofibrillary tangles, which ultimately causes the death of these cells. Pathological sites as a result of these processes atrophy, and damage over time captures the entire brain, and this process, alas, is irreversible.

How is Alzheimer's dementia developing?

All stages of dementia in Alzheimer's disease are characterized primarily by the increase in short-term memory disturbances, and as progression progresses, and by narrowing the range of interests, inadequate resourcefulness, inattention, passivity, slowness of thinking and motor reactions, irritability.

Later, patients find out a misunderstanding of the events around them, they can repeat this for a long time, inadequately treat others, uncritically - to themselves. And over time, they can develop paranoid ideas and hallucinations.

Total dementia in this case is accompanied by muscle rigidity and violation of control over urination and rectification of the intestine. There may be epileptic seizures.

How many live with this type of dementia, depends on many reasons, and on average this is about 6 years, but the process can last as long as 20 years. As a rule, lethal outcome is caused by intercurrent (accidental) diseases that have appeared against the background of dementia.

Alzheimer's disease, according to statistics, is the cause of dementia in 70% of recorded cases. But, unfortunately, not only this pathology can push to the beginning of dementia development.

Vascular dementia: causes and symptoms

Against the background of cerebral circulatory disorders, vascular dementia develops. In elderly people, as already mentioned, it can be triggered by atherosclerosis, hypertension, cerebral vascular ischaemia, arrhythmia, heart defects, pathologies of the heart valves, or high blood lipids. By the way, in the male part of the population the predisposition to the vascular form of dementia is one and a half times higher than that of women.

At the initial stage of the disease symptoms are expressed by irritability, increased fatigue, sleep disorders, lethargy and headaches. Scattering and depressive feelings become systematic.

In the future, the patient noticeably disrupted memory. This is expressed in disorientation, as well as in forgetting names, dates, and so on.

By the way, how dementia develops, how many years the patients with this diagnosis live, depends on whether there was a stroke in their history. In this case, the life expectancy is greatly reduced. Neurological symptoms of this pathology are: hemiparesis, stiffness, speech disorders, swallowing, walking and urination.

Can I not miss the onset of dementia? Symptoms of the disease

Unfortunately, the initial stages of advancing dementia are almost impossible to catch, since it is a long and slow process that can last for 10-15 years. A person gradually worsens memory of what happened recently, but there are memories of long-ago events.

Dementia in the elderly is mainly manifested by the loss of learning and learning ability. Patients are more difficult to navigate in space and time. And soon it turns out that it is already quite difficult for them to choose the right words, and their speech is considerably impoverished. By the way, no less problems arise in the process of operating with numbers.

It is interesting that some people with this for a long time are able to hide the characteristics characteristic of dementia, avoiding complex actions (for example, checks on a checkbook). And gives them a markedly reduced interest in reading and any kind of activity. Those who can not rebuild their lives find themselves in a difficult situation, as they have less ability to perform daily duties - people often forget about important things or conduct them incorrectly.

How Dementia Begins

Of course, the development of dementia and the duration of life with this disease depend on a variety of causes: health status, past illnesses, personal characteristics, the attitudes of others and much more. But if we talk about the signs of the disease as a whole, then we can distinguish some common features of the changes occurring in man:

• Most often, changes in the nature of the patient become especially noticeable. It exacerbates its individual qualities of personality, for example, frugality develops into stinginess, and perseverance - into stubbornness.
• It is increasingly difficult for a human being, or rather, it is impossible to change an established view of events. He develops conservatism.
• Thought processes are deteriorating.
• Often, the listed signs are followed by violations of moral norms of behavior (patients with dementia lose their sense of shame, the concept of duty, their spiritual values and vital interests are leveled).

With time, noticeable changes in the state of memory and disturbances in temporal and spatial orientation also begin. True, for a long time the features of the behavior, gestures and speeches of a particular person remain unchanged.

The last stage of dementia development

As you know, the fastest extinction of the patient occurs at the last, severe stage of the disease. The development of dementia at this time is characterized by the trembling of the fingers, the violation of coordination and gait, exhaustion. The patient's speech becomes abrupt, and information about himself becomes fragmentary.

An elderly person in this state can no longer take care of himself without assistance, eat and observe elementary rules of hygiene. In most patients there is a violation of the process of urination. This can be both stagnant processes, and uncontrolled urinary excretion.

The illness shortens the life of those who are sick of it, due to the fact that in a severe stage of dementia the patient is no longer able to report ailments to the doctor, moreover, in elderly people, fever or leukocytosis usually does not develop as a response to infection. The doctor in this situation has to rely only on his discernment and experience, but, unfortunately, any associated infection can cause the death of such a patient.

Features of the course of senile dementia

It is interesting that the so-called senile, or senile, dementia in the elderly demonstrates at times a distinct dissociation between sheer dementia and the forms of behavior that have been preserved in their former form. The patient remains unchanged the old manner of holding, gestures, correct speech, live intonations. All this often misleads an outsider. He thinks he is talking with an absolutely healthy person, and only an accidentally asked question reveals that an interesting talking old man, telling a lot of examples from the past, is not able to tell how old he is, whether he has a family where he lives and with whom Says now.

Senile dementia in the elderly in most cases is not accompanied by psychotic conditions that are inherent in the vascular form of this disease. This, of course, greatly facilitates the life of the patient himself and his family, since such a patient does not cause serious trouble to his surroundings.

But often in this category of patients there are signs of psychosis, which are accompanied by insomnia or inversion (shift in time) of sleep. These patients may have hallucinations, suspicion worsens, mood swings emerge from emotion to aggression.

And to provoke all these severe symptoms can change the level of sugar in the blood, pressure drops and other problems with the state of health. Therefore, it is very important to protect elderly demented people from all sorts of diseases that are both chronic and acute.

Why senile dementia occurs

For what reason does senile dementia appear in the elderly, why in these cases does the human brain begin to age faster than normal, until it is unclear to the end.

Some researchers believe that in the old age there are violations of immune regulation, which causes autoimmune processes. And the resulting autoantibodies damage the cells of the brain. Cerebrospinal fluid, which contains normally immunocompetent cells that play a protective role, greatly changes their relationship and properties in old age, which leads to pathological changes in the central nervous system.

Dementia in the elderly is also due to a genetic factor. It was found that the risk of the disease rises 4.3 times in those families where there have already been cases of this pathology. Somatic diseases can reveal symptoms before this mildly senile dementia, change its picture and accelerate the course of the flow, while the timely elimination of these ailments can in some cases lead to a slower development of dementia.

Life expectancy of patients with a diagnosis of "dementia", at what age does it wait

Researchers from the University of Cambridge have established the life expectancy of patients who have an established diagnosis of "senile dementia." How many years live Such patients, according to scientists, largely depends on external factors, but on average this amounts to 4.5-5 years.

By the way, statistics confirm that dementia at the age of 60 to 69 years occurs in about 2% of cases, and after 80 years it is already susceptible to up to 20% of older people. By the age of 90, the risk of getting sick increases to 45%.

Although it should be noted that these figures are very approximate, since a fairly large percentage of older people do not fall under the supervision of psychiatrists, because they do not have psychotic conditions, and it all comes down to problems with memory, intelligence and slight mood swings. Such patients are in families, they are fairly easy to take care of, and they do not create big problems for relatives.

Speaking about how many live patients with dementia, it should be stressed once again that the dead is precisely from this diagnosis is very little. These include only those who died from accidents related to the characteristics of the disease. Basically, death comes from a stroke or a heart attack, most often accompanying the vascular form of the disease.

What is the prognosis of dementia?

Being more and more common in elderly people, the described pathology is mostly irreversible, and modern medicine, unfortunately, can only slow down the process or remove the unpleasant symptoms arising from the diagnosis of "dementia".

How many years live with this disease, it is difficult to say, for example, with the rapid progression of the vascular form, a fatal outcome is possible in a few months. The reason for this is most often concomitant diseases in the form of sepsis (in bed patients) or pneumonia.