Even healthy brains work less efficiently with age, and memory, sensory perceptions and physical abilities become less reliable.
Dementia in a younger adult is especially traumatic and challenging for families to acknowledge, and many practicing physicians fail to recognise it or even suspect it may be an underlying cause of symptoms. The accompanying editorial by Dr Knopman called young-onset dementia “an underappreciated problem”. Its diagnosis, he wrote, is often delayed, and knowledge about its management is “in short supply as well”.The Dutch study found that overall, Alzheimer’s disease was the most common cause of young-onset dementia. But when symptoms developed before age 50, early-onset Alzheimer’s was a less likely explanation than two other causes: Vascular dementia and frontotemporal dementia.
Lewy body disease is another cause of dementia in younger adults. It is associated with abnormal deposits of a protein called alpha-synuclein in the brain that affects brain chemistry and leads to behavioral, thought and movement problems. People with Alzheimer’s typically have a buildup of abnormal substances — tau and beta-amyloid proteins — in the brain. Early symptoms include impaired memory, language problems, difficulty concentrating and finishing tasks, poor judgment and visual or spatial deficits that result in problems like driving errors and getting lost.
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