World Alzheimer's Day 2021: Different stages of the disease, and a recent study

Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease that is characterised by worsening forgetfulness and getting lost in familiar places. Forgetting things, important dates or events, losing track of the day, date, time and place, losing way to the house, difficulty while reading, unable to identify relatives and friends are common traits of people with Alzheimer’s or dementia.

The disease progresses over time and at later stages, a person may lose the ability to speak and walk.

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To raise awareness about the disease, September 21 every year is marked as World Alzheimer's Day.

The disease is usually noticed when a person starts misplacing things, forgetting about recent events, conversations and common places.

A person close to the patient may start noticing these changes.

Stages of the disease

Dr Rajesh Benny, Consultant Neurologist, Fortis Hospital Mulund explains the stages of Alzheimer's disease.

Stage 1 - No clinical impairment:Like other neurodegenerative diseases, this stage can precede the memory loss by many years where the affected individual is clinically okay.

Stage 2 - Very mild cognitive decline:This implies the forgetfulness associated with normal ageing, where an individual misplaces objects and can eventually find them after a period of search.

Stage 3 - Mild cognitive decline:Recent memory worsens, which becomes apparent to the relatives. The patient suffers in daily functioning such as bank work, money issues, etc. and may be confused occasionally.

Stage 4 - Moderate cognitive decline:Memory worsens further with difficulty doing tasks that need multitasking. The patients start losing their way around unfamiliar places and become socially withdrawn.

Stage 5 - Moderately severe cognitive decline:In this stage, the patient may even forget their current surroundings, home address, telephone number and need assistance for simple tasks like dressing. Losing way in familiar surroundings also happens.

Stage 6 - Severe cognitive decline:There is worsening of behaviour with irritability and hallucinations. The patients experience memory loss even for past events and start losing control of their bladder/ bowel functions.

Stage 7 - Very severe cognitive decline:During this stage, most of them lose the ability to speak, communicate and even walk around or move by now.

A recent report by Alzheimer’s Disease International (ADI), has revealed that over 41 million people living with dementia worldwide remain undiagnosed.

Experts are of the opinion that getting diagnosed with the disease is vital, as it will ensure that those affected would receive timely support and treatment, which is more effective the earlier it begins, and to take part in clinical trials.

Meanwhile, another research done by McGill University in Montreal, Canada, showed that as many as 90% of people with dementia have not been diagnosed in some countries.

Dementia is one of the biggest health challenges worldwide. According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), it is currently the seventh leading cause of death among all diseases and one of the major causes of disability and dependency among older people worldwide

Paola Barbarino, the chief executive of ADI, said a lack of awareness and stigma within healthcare systems was severely hampering efforts to support people living with dementia.

“This misinformation in our healthcare systems, along with a lack of trained specialists and readily available diagnosis tools, have contributed to alarmingly low diagnosis rates,” said the Guardian quoted Barbarino, who also serves as a board member of the World Dementia Council.