The need for early diagnosis to prevent dementia

JAKARTA (IM) — Lothar Matheus MV Silalahi, neurologist specialist at Siloam Hospital in Yogyakarta, said early diagnosis is important to prevent dementia or senility. He said early diagnosis is important because modern medical treatments cannot guarantee recovery for people with dementia.
However, he continued, when at some point the management of dementia sufferers is optimized so that they don’t get worse or reach the next level of severity. “The goal is for patients to adapt to their conditions with the highest quality of life,” she said, in a statement.
He explained that a neurological, mental exam and what is known as a sublime functional test will initiate the diagnostic action. In addition, brain scans, CT scans, MRI or PET scans, and other supportive measures are done. Some special therapy and it is important to have the support of family and environment.
“Like a house, dementia and one of the rooms in it is Alzheimer’s. Alzheimer’s can be interpreted as one of the most common types of dementia,” she said.
Continuous consultation is the right step to monitor developments. The ideal treatment is to live a healthy lifestyle, exercise regularly, adequate nutritional intake while exercising your brain regularly. Also, it is important to manage comorbidities, such as diabetes, cholesterol, high blood pressure, which are things that can be done to prevent dementia disorders.
Dementia, he continued, can occur when the brain is degraded due to diseases, such as Alzheimer’s, stroke and head trauma.
“In detail, dementia is a condition of reduced brain function, such as loss of memory and the ability to judge or even memory, thought patterns and will interfere with the independence of the sufferer’s activities,” he said.
Among the many types of dementia, data show that Alzheimer’s is often found, which will be associated with genetic and protein changes in the brain. There are also other types such as vascular dementia which is caused by disturbances in the blood vessels of the brain.
Risk factors include age, family genetics, unhealthy eating patterns, lack of exercise, smoking and alcoholism. Risk factors are also triggered by several conditions such as depression, Down syndrome, sleep apnea, high blood pressure, obesity and diabetes.
The main symptoms of people with dementia are memory loss and changes in thought patterns that are evident in behavior and language and tend to get worse over time.