Vascular dementia is a degenerative disorder that is related to the obstruction of the vessels blood vessels, which causes a progressive loss of memory and all functions cognitive. This type of disease causes the death of a large number of neurons in the brain because the person suffering from it suffers from small strokes causing the nutrients and oxygen that carry the blood supply to the brain to be blocked and / or interrupted. People who suffer from vascular dementia have a great deterioration in their concentration, they gradually lose their abilities to carry out their daily tasks, they may be listless, depressed and experience other symptoms of this type of disorder.
In this Psychology-Online article: vascular dementia: phases, symptoms and treatment, We are going to explain in more detail what this disease consists of.
Vascular dementia can damage different parts of the brain, so the symptoms will depend on the area that has been affected. The symptoms also depend on what has been the cause of the disease, although in all cases it will affect memory. It must be taken into account that the age of the person, the sex and the phase in which they are, however the most common symptoms are the following:
- Confusion. It is very common that she is confused about everything. For example, you may not remember where you are, what you have to do, who the people around you are, among other things.
- Difficulty communicating. They have many difficulties in language, it is difficult for them to express their desires and / or emotions since they forget the words or their meanings, they also have a hard time having a conversation with someone, they tend to lose the thread of the conversation with ease.
- Walking with little confidence. As they do not know exactly where they want to go and do not remember the path to follow, they tend to walk with suspicion and slowly.
- Personality changes The person is no longer the same, her personality, as the stages of the disease progress, changes in a notorious way. One of the causes may be that she loses control of herself due to the symptoms that she is experiencing and that they are increasingly incapacitating.
- Urinary incontinence It is very common for people with this disorder to have serious problems controlling their urge to urinate (adult enureris), so they may not realize it and many need to use protectors to prevent accidents.
- They lose logic and their common sense. Due to memory loss they experience, forgetting words and their meanings, etc. it is increasingly difficult for them to make personal judgments according to their values as these are disappearing over time and their short-term memory is severely affected, so they quickly forget what they have saying.
- Difficulty manipulating objects. As this disease progresses, they have more difficulty remembering how objects should be handled and what their function is.
There is no specific drug treatment that has been able to demonstrate its effectiveness one hundred percent since the lesions in vascular dementia are irreversible. However, what we can do is prevent it from occurring or prevent a person who has already suffered it from doing it again. Although we cannot regain lost cognitive functions, we can help prevent or delay the progression of this disease. Some tips to help prevent vascular dementia include the following:
- You should try to keep track of blood pressure, for this it is necessary to eat a healthy and well-balanced diet.
- Avoid alcohol and tobacco consumption as much as possible.
- Avoid the obesity and being overweight, for this, apart from having a healthy diet, it is advisable to exercise (always taking into account the physical situation of the person and adapt the exercise to it).
- It is advisable for diabetic people to always have control over their blood glucose and glycosylated hemoglobin levels.
- Follow your doctor's recommendations.
This article is merely informative, in Psychology-Online we do not have the power to make a diagnosis or recommend a treatment. We invite you to go to a psychologist to treat your particular case.
If you want to read more articles similar to Vascular dementia: phases, symptoms and treatment, we recommend that you enter our category of Neuropsychology.
