What is Dementia?

Dementia isn’t a disease. Instead, it’s a group of symptoms caused by other conditions. You might also hear it called major neurocognitive disorder.

Some cause for these symptoms are curable, it is why it is very important to have an accurate diagnoses for it’s cause.

Causes of dementia that may be reversible include:

• Reaction to medications
• Infections of the brain
• Compromise Immune disorder like leukemia
• Emotional distress, depression
• Poisoning caused by carbon monoxide, heavy metals..
• Alcohol or drug abuse
• Tumors
• Subdural hematomas, blood clots beneath the outer covering of the brain
• Normal-pressure hydrocephalus, a buildup of fluid in the brain
• Metabolic disorders such as a vitamin B12 deficiency
• Low levels of thyroid hormones, called hypothyroidism
• Low blood sugar, called hypoglycemia
• HIV-associated neurocognitive disorders (HAND)
• Heart and lung disease causing low oxygen.

These forms of dementia are partially manageable, but they aren’t reversible and get worse over time:

• Alzheimer’s disease
• Vascular dementia
• Dementia from Parkinson’s disease and similar disorders
• Dementia with Lewy bodies
• Frontotemporal dementia (Pick’s disease)
• Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease

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