As many as 35 million people worldwide have Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia among adults over 60 years of age. That figure could reach 115 million by 2050, concludes the nonprofit Alzheimer's Disease International. In the U.S., about 5 percent of adults 65 to 74 have Alzheimer's, and nearly half of those age 85 and older may have it, according to figures of the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention. 

The predominant explanation for how Alzheimer's disease develops and ravages the brain are explained at a new site built by TheVisualMD. We present a few examples of the stunning graphics used on the site below. You can read the complete e-book at TheVisualMD landing page here.

Visualization is courtesy of TheVisualMD.com

 In Alzheimer's disease, an abnormal protein called amyloid beta begins to appear on the neurons, forming plaques and compromising brain activity.

 Another protein implicated in Alzheimer's is the tau protein:

 Besides age, other risk factors include family history, previous brain trauma, heart disease and gender (the prevalence rate for women over 70 is 16 percent, compared with men at 11 percent).

Despite much research, no drug exists to cure the disease or modify its relentless progression toward cognitive decline, although some drugs may lessen symptoms for a limited period. Some simple steps may help cut your chances of getting the disease or slow it down, such as pursuing an active life, eating right and staying socially engaged.

1 Comments

1. 1. BrainWorld 10:07 AM 11/4/11

   Alzheimer's Disease is indistinguishable from Mad Cow Disease (in humans they call it Creutzfeld-Jacob Disease or CJD) until after death when an autopsy can be performed to tell one from the other. In a number of clinical studies when such autopsies have been performed, anywhere between 5% to 15% of the patients who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's actually had CJD. Therefore based on what is known now and until larger studies are done it is a reasonable assumption that about 10% of all Alzheimer's patients actually have CJD. The exact number of Alzheimer's patients are unknown but a ballpark estimate for U.S. Alzheimer's sufferers is around 400,000 people. The data would therefore suggest about 40,000 of them actually have the communicable disease CJD instead of Alzheimer's. To put that into perspective, the Polio epidemic of the 1950's had about 50,000 victims, not too far off from present estimates of CJD. That means CJD is epidemic in this country but it isn't being talked about, the FDA and some MD's and other professionals understand these numbers and their implications but for some reason are keeping it under wraps, probably as a result of lobbying from the meat industry, which doesn't want lose profits by paying the extra $20 it would cost to test each steer or cow they cut up to feed to you. So only a few animals in the U.S. get tested, unlike some countries like in the EU and Japan which wisely tests each one. And the epidemic continues. You might want to think twice about whether you want to expose yourself to this risk or not because it is a horrible thing to lose your mind to dementia.

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