事件记录
面试官: 101年阿尔茨海默氏症. 这是什么？? 大脑里发生了什么? 有哪些症状? 大发娱乐能做些什么，潜在的治疗方法又有哪些. 大发娱乐与 Dr. 诺曼•福斯特, Director of the Center for Alzheimer Care, 成像, and 研究 at the University of Utah.
首先，大发娱乐来谈谈什么是老年痴呆症? What are the characteristics of Alzheimer's, and what's actually happening in the brain? 我觉得挺有意思的.
什么是阿尔茨海默病?
Dr. 福斯特: 阿尔茨海默病 是一种导致神经细胞丧失的大脑进行性疾病吗, 因此，患者首先会出现记忆困难. But then increasingly over time have difficulty with other areas of thinking and then eventually difficulty with daily activities so that they become dependent on others.
面试官: 你说的神经细胞是指脑细胞吗?
Dr. 福斯特: 这些是脑细胞. 是的，没错.
面试官: 这些是脑细胞. 以及大脑中到底发生了什么? 我听说它被称为大脑的斑块. 这种说法准确与否?
Dr. 福斯特: 好吧, 阿尔茨海默病 is caused by an abnormal accumulation of two proteins that normally occur in the brain, 但在这种疾病中异常地聚集成斑块和缠结. 和 we now understand a lot of the basic biology of these uncontrolled protein accumulations. 但大发娱乐不知道是什么引发了这个过程.
面试官: 所以这些蛋白质开始在大脑中积累. 它们真的附着在脑细胞上吗?
Dr. 福斯特: 没有直接. 它们相互附着. So they begin with small fragments of protein, and then they aggregate into clumps. 最终形成这些空斑, 或者在tau蛋白的例子中, 是什么使神经原纤维缠结. These fibrils actually kind of have a spun or twisting appearance and interfere with normal nerve function.
面试官: 这有点把事情搞砸了.
Dr. 福斯特: 这是正确的. 据大发娱乐所知，这种疾病只涉及大脑.
阿尔茨海默病的症状
面试官: 你之前谈到了症状. What are some things that if I'm a relative of somebody that I believe might be getting Alzheimer's I would want to be looking about for?
Dr. 福斯特: 好吧, 晚年的典型特征, 平均在70年代中期, 人们开始有记忆困难. 当然，大发娱乐都有记忆方面的抱怨.
面试官: 是的.
Dr. 福斯特: 大发娱乐的记忆并不完美. 大发娱乐不像电脑一样工作, but in these cases it interferes with a person's ability to do daily activities that they've been used to carrying out independently.
面试官: So, 例如, perhaps they forget where they are when they're driving someplace where they've driven to numerous times.
Dr. 福斯特: 这是有可能的. 这就是为什么要就医, 医疗建议非常重要，因为有些事情是显而易见的, but we think it's very important to pick these up when things are not so obvious. 因此可能需要医学判断.
One of the 例子s that I would use having trouble remembering exactly where I parked in a large shopping mall. 这是正常的, but after four or five hours not being able to figure out where it is or how to get help, 这是不正常.
面试官: 或者如何获得大发娱乐. 这也是一个有趣的补充. 说到老年痴呆症, what can be done if you go and you talk to a physician to help you find some of those non-subtle things, 你的家人被诊断出患有老年痴呆症, 那么?
记忆丧失的类型
Dr. 福斯特: 嗯，我认为重要的第一步是了解发生了什么. 这是相当大的一步. 事实上, there's quite a bit of effort to evaluate what the cause of memory problems and cognitive problems are.
面试官: 可能不是阿兹海默症.
Dr. 福斯特: 可能不是阿兹海默症. 可能是阿兹海默症，还有别的. 例如，安眠药很常见. Even over the counter sleeping medications can make 阿尔茨海默病 significantly worse, 或者它会引起类似阿尔茨海默病的症状.
所以首先，确保你知道你在处理什么是很重要的. 然后，当然，这将导致应该做些什么.
面试官: 好吧.
阿尔茨海默氏症的药物
Dr. 福斯特: So there are many things that can be done about 阿尔茨海默病 where medications that are approved by the Food and Drug Administration that we know have benefits. 不幸的是, 他们现在只是很谦虚, 所以大发娱乐正在寻找更有效的药物治疗方法.
面试官: 这能减缓阿尔茨海默氏症的发作吗？”? 它能恢复一些记忆吗? 这些药物有什么作用?
Dr. 福斯特: 目前联邦药监局批准的药物.D.A. compensate for chemical losses that occur in the brain typically in 阿尔茨海默病. 很多药物都是针对阿尔茨海默病的, 不要影响或改善所有的记忆和思维问题. But this is actually the kind of chemical byproducts of the plaques and tangles rather than getting at the plaques and tangles themselves.
面试官: 那些化学副产品有什么用?
Dr. 福斯特: 大发娱乐的神经脑细胞通过所谓的突触相互交流. So there's a chemical that's released at the end of one nerve that is then picked up by another nerve. 所以当神经生病的时候, 它们很难合成, 创造了这个化学信息系统, 而这些药物的作用就是试图弥补这一点, 恢复一些阿尔茨海默氏症患者失去的化学变化.
面试官: 还能做什么呢? 所以你有一些药物. 还有其他选择吗?
阿尔茨海默氏症的治疗方法
Dr. 福斯特: 正确的. 所以现在最重要的一件事就是大发娱乐病人. 患者需要在日常活动或做事方面得到大发娱乐. 为, 例子, 如果只是记忆问题, then one of the things you need to do is write down things so that you can read and to see what you remember.
大发娱乐不能再做或依赖一些大发娱乐以前认为理所当然的事情. 比如，你在医生的办公室里. 医生说：“两周后再来找我。”他们会给你一个日期. 然后在医生离开办公室之后如果他们没有写下来的话, 你不记得那天了.
面试官: 是的.
Dr. 福斯特: 现在, 也许这种事会发生在大发娱乐任何人身上, 把这些都写下来或者做个日历是个好主意. 但如果你知道自己患有阿尔茨海默病或记忆力有问题, 这是你必须非常注意的. 但还有一些事情是可以预测的. 阿尔茨海默病的并发症，我称之为需要解决的问题.
阿尔茨海默病的其他影响
例如, 有记忆问题的人会为此感到尴尬, and so we often see that patients and often other family members become socially isolated. 这与患有这种疾病的人所需要的完全相反. 他们需要与他人互动，有良好的生活质量. 和 not leaving your house, and sometimes the wife or husband not leaving the house also, that's bad.
另一个例子是社会活动. You may be embarrassed because of memory problems and withdraw from your friends at the very time that there's most important to you. 然后还有家庭问题. 一个家庭不明白发生了什么. 他们误解了, 因此, 根据他们做出的错误假设采取行动, particularly if they haven't sought medical advice to understand what's going on.
所以一个女儿可能会想，“好吧，他只是想报复我. 这就是他不做事的原因.或者“我觉得他只是抑郁，所以大发娱乐应该试着让他开心。.或者这与药物有关. 有各种各样可能的解释, 但家庭成员因分歧和冲突而四分五裂, 在如何支持他们所爱的人的问题上意见不一. 然后大发娱乐经常看到灾难, 不仅是社会上的并发症，还有家庭内部的并发症.
面试官: 阿尔茨海默氏症似乎会影响大脑. 它是直接影响你的身体，还是间接影响? 你尴尬. 你不能离开家. 所以现在你没有得到任何锻炼. 你没有任何社交互动. 那是更危险的地方吗?
阿尔茨海默病致命吗？?
Dr. 福斯特: 我经常被问到阿尔茨海默病是否会致人死亡? 和 we know the people who have 阿尔茨海默病 at every point in their illness are at greater risk of death. 现在, 这不仅仅是因为斑块和缠结, 而是因为大发娱乐依靠大脑做很多事情.
面试官: 是的.
Dr. 福斯特: 你刚刚描述了其中的一些. 大发娱乐的动力, 例如, 起来走吧, 所有这些都对大发娱乐的身体健康有很大的影响. We know that people should be active, but also it affects our ability to seek help. 例如, 如果你有胸痛，你不能寻求大发娱乐, then you're going to die from a heart attack more likely than somebody who does seek help.
如果你忘记服用治疗糖尿病的药物, 那么你就会有糖尿病的并发症，早死于糖尿病. Our brain also-in ways that we don't as much understand-are involved with basic daily function and maintaining our physical health. 所以那些脑部受伤的人, whether it's due to trauma or other things die earlier than people who have good functioning brains.
阿尔茨海默病新研究
面试官: 让大发娱乐来谈谈一些潜在的治疗方法或即将出现的让你兴奋的事情. I know that you keep very in touch with the research that's going on in the United States and the world. 希望就在眼前吗?
Dr. 福斯特: 还有希望. 大发娱乐对阿尔茨海默病了解得更多了. 和 I think one of the important things to recognize is that Alzheimer's isn't simple. 这是一种复杂的疾病. 有两种蛋白质聚集在一起. 它们以复杂的方式影响大脑. 它们会改变大脑的化学成分.
So I think that it's unrealistic to expect that we're going to find a single drug or penicillin that's going to cure the disease. 它更类似于癌症. 大发娱乐要循序渐进, 逐步改进, 确定这种疾病如何发展并阻止其发展.
和, 当然, a lot of our efforts now are in trying to develop treatments that we would give early in the disease before there's so much damage to the brain. So we think that it's much more difficult after there is so much damage to the brain of correcting the problem. 所以早期识别, 早期治疗是大发娱乐的方向, 有许多令人兴奋的可能性.
We know that these two proteins that accumulate in the brain do so when they get slightly off balance earlier in life. So these slight differences or the slight imbalance over a period of years becomes devastating to the brain. 和 if we can offset even in a little way this imbalance, then we'll be a long way to brain health.
此外，大发娱乐知道大脑不是静态的. 大脑可以改变. 大脑，大发娱乐称之为可塑性. 它对环境的不同做出反应, and there's good evidence now that some older individuals have resistant brains to these effect. 这种弹性是大发娱乐试图利用的东西之一, understand why some patients are so devastated by the same changes that can have less effect in others.
是时候给予老年痴呆症患者最好的照顾了. 他们应该得到照顾的尊严和尊严.
更新日期：2020年12月2日
最初发布日期：2013年9月25日