New Saliva Test May Enable Of Early Detection of Alzheimer's

Dementia of any kind is a devastating diagnosis both for the patient and for family and friends. In most of the industrialized world, the most common form of dementia is Alzheimer's disease, which has been identified in 5.4 million people in the United States alone, over 200,000 of them under the age of 65. Epidemiologists expect that 11 to 15 million Americans could be in care for the disease by 2050. 

Alzheimer's disease is no less common in other countries. Researchers have found that French women who carry three out of four genes specific to Alzheimer's have a 35 percent risk of developing the condition by age 85, and those who carry four out of four genes for the disease have a 68 percent risk. Even in places like China, Korea, India, and Nigeria, Alzheimer's is commonly diagnosed in people as young as 40.

• Even though Alzheimer's disease is not curable, it is somewhat treatable. The sooner patients are diagnosed, the sooner they can get treatments that may slow down the progression of the disease and keep them communicative and active longer.
• Families and other caretakers need time to prepare for long-term care. A pronouncement that a loved one cannot return home after a hospitalization, that he or she has to be put into long-term care immediately and will never go home, isn't just devastating to the patient. It is also devastating to the family. Even the most basic nursing home care, in the United States, will cost $1,000 a week or more. This has to be paid by the patient or the patient's family in cash, unless the patient goes on Medicaid. Every state has a Medicaid program for Alzheimer's patients, but no state allows the patient and the patient's spouse to retain more than $3,000 in non-exempt assets. Otherwise, savings, retirement plans, investments, cars, second homes, and even furniture may have to go, not just for the patient, but for the husband or wife of the patient. Alzheimer's patients who receive Medicaid in the USA cannot even retain savings for a decent funeral and burial. There are things that can be done to lighten these burdens with a few (usually three or four) years to prepare.
• Resources for dealing with Alzheimer's are available, but families and patients in crisis mode cannot usually find them. An American friend of mine had to put his father into a nursing home after an infection greatly accelerated the course of his dementia. His father did not have a clear power of attorney, in fact, he had two contradictory powers of attorney. His father did not have a clear advanced directive. He had filled out multiple advanced directives. This made it impossible for my friend to access social services and counselors and at-home care to keep his father at home just a little bit longer, and the father died just six weeks after being placed in a nursing home. 

Using Saliva To Test For Alzheimer's

1. Challenges in planning or solving problems. Not remembering to pay the bills, to keep appointments, or how to accomplish familiar tests is an early warning sign of dementia.
2. Loss of executive function, the ability to make good decisions. Many people in the early stages of dementia give or spend money inappropriately, or enter inappropriate relationships. Of course, people who are not suffering dementia may make choices of which their families do not approve.
3. Memory loss interferes with daily life. Not being abile to remember where you parked the car, or where you put the keys, or how to knot a tie or to tie one's shoes may be signs of cognitive decline.
4. Confusion regarding time and place. Failure to recognize the day of the week (driving to a church that meets on Sunday on a Saturday, for example) or familiar surroundings (not knowing where one is) are early warning signs.
5. Difficulty interpreting images. A person in cognitive decline may misidentify television personalities or even family members by sight.
6. New problems with reading, writing, or spelling. An American friend of mine tells the story of a person who interpreted the advertising slogan "Got milk?" as "Goat milk?"
7. Changes in mood or personality. As people recognize their cognitive abilities are failing, they may not know whom to trust. They may become suspicious, defensive, and irritable.
8. Misplacing things. Losing everyday objects is a common problem in the early stages of Alzheimer's.
9. Inability to trace steps. People who have pre-Alzheimer's easily get lost in new locations.
10. Innumeracy. People who have early-stage dementia often lose their ability to add and subtract, and to understand the meanings of numbers, for instance, whether $1000 is a little or a lot of money or whether 1000 calories is a small or large serving.