Alzheimer's Disease Signs & Symptoms

Conditions & Diseases: Brain & Nervous System

Alzheimer's Disease

Signs & Symptoms

The 10 most common symptoms for Alzheimer's disease include:

1. Loss of Memory: Forgetting some recent incidents and inability to recall information is a common sign of AD.

2. Performance of familiar tasks: People face difficulty in performing daily activities such as preparing a meal or coffee, operating an oven, making a telephone call, or playing a game.

3. Communicating: People suffering from AD forget simple words and substitute some irrelevant words in their speech, thus making it difficult to understand for the listener.

4. Disorientation: People forget their familiar surroundings, neighborhood, grocery store, post-office, etc., wondering how they got there and do not know how to return home or their starting point.

5. Poor or reduced judgment: People suffering with AD tend to wear inappropriate clothing such as wearing bare minimum clothing on a cold day and dressing in cold weather clothes on a hot day.

6. Abstract thinking: People with AD experience a “...difficulty in performing complex mental tasks” such as adding numbers, multiplying, dividing, subtracting, and sometimes even forget the purpose of numbers and calculation.

7. Misplacing articles: People tend to misplace articles in unusual places such as placing a wristwatch in a sugar bowl or a plastic container in a gas stove.

8. Mood or behavioral changes: People suffering from AD exhibit rapid changes in moods - going from a happy, joyous mood to tears to anger for no apparent reason.

9. Change in personality: Dramatic changes in personality of people suffering from AD are observed, such as they become “extremely confused, suspicious, fearful or more dependent on family members.”

10. Loss of initiative: People suffering from AD become passive. For example watching TV for longer durations, sleeping for longer hours and not performing normal activities (11).

See Also:
Alzheimer's Disease: Introduction
Alzheimer's Disease: Types
Alzheimer's Disease: Causes & Risk Factors
Alzheimer's Disease: Signs & Symptoms
Alzheimer's Disease: Stages
Alzheimer's Disease: Medical Tests & Diagnosis Methods
Alzheimer's Disease: Treatment Options & Prevention

Article by Kona Vishnu, MS
Medical Writer,
OmniMedicalSearch.com

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Page Last Modified:
11/23/2010