The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) can identify cognitive impairments caused by conditions other than Alzheimer's disease.
Some neurological diseases affect younger people, including Parkinson's disease, vascular cognitive impairment, Huntington's disease, brain tumors, pituitary brain tumors, multiple sclerosis and other conditions such as traumatic brain injury, depression, schizophrenia and heart failure.
It is also important to rule out confusion causes that may be masquerading as Alzheimer's.
"The No. 1 thing, by far, are medicines and also vitamin deficiencies and diseases like thyroid disease," says Dr. Mark Pippenger, an associate clinical professor of neurology and director of the Walker Memory Center at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences' Reynolds Institute on Aging.
"Low B-12 can create the appearance of dementia," says Priscilla Pittman, program director with Alzheimer's Arkansas Programs and Services.
"Other factors that can be confused with Alzheimer's include depression, urinary tract infection, or various medicines which are being taken," she says, adding that a drug containing Benadryl could cause someone over the age of 60 to appear demented.
"Everything we take has a side effect, and we need to be very cognizant of the possible side effects," she says.
And then there's emotional and physical stress -- like the toll on people who care for someone with dementia.
"Sometimes the caregivers feel like they have the signs of Alzheimer's themselves when the stress disguises itself as memory issues," Pittman says.
"We really stress the need for caregivers to get respite care for themselves. Strokes and heart attacks are killing the caregivers."
ActiveStyle on 07/13/2015