Saturday, October 31, 2009

How can a person with alzheimers drive a car or wonder from home and not get in a car wreck,or hit by a car.?

I've heard that some end up in another city. I'm only 47 and I forget things a lot and it scares me.
Answer:
You bring up a great question. Someone with Alzheimer’s should not be out wandering the streets, but it does happen—and it generally ends badly. Many nursing homes that serve the dementia population have monitoring systems in place, such as Wanderguard. These systems can also be used in the home environment. It may seem cruel to put a tracking bracelet on someone who isn’t a criminal, but it goes a long way in assuring safety.

If you think your memory is weakening, there’s a lot you can do to strengthen it. While it is unlikely you are currently experience early onset dementia, it wouldn’t hurt to keep your mind limber. I recommend a video game called Brain Age. I actually wrote a blog on this a while back for Gilbert Guide, a resource for long-term care. Here’s an excerpt:

“In addition to detecting and improving the effects of Alzheimer’s, computerized games can also help keep middle-aged minds agile. Nintendo, a staple of my youth, has come up with a game called Brain Age. The company contends that using the game for only minutes a day and engaging in “cerebral workouts” can stimulate the mind enough to actually decrease one’s “brain age.” All you need is a Nintendo DS to jump right in and start reading literary classics aloud, solving math problems and drawing from memory, just to name a few tasks. The game was founded in Japan, released as “Dr. Kawashima’s Brain Training: How Old Is Your Brain?” in Europe and released in the US as “Brain Age” in April of 2006. Some skeptics have asserted that improvement in Sudoku is hardly an indication of one’s capacity to better conduct activities of daily living. One thing is certain—marketing to baby boomers and seniors is a smart move for a company with vast competition in targeting the teen market.”

Click here to read the rest of the post:

http://www.gilbertguide.com/blog/2007/01...

If you don’t see yourself playing video games to strengthen your memory, try sudoku. A little mental challenge goes a long way!

I hope this information helps,
Lori
They can't. Once you are diagnosed with Alzheimer's you can no longer drive. And you shouldn't go out of the house alone.
Don't worry about your forgetfulness. My mother always said, "Oh no...I forgot_____. I must have Alzheimer's!" And I would tell her, "Mom, as long as you can say you "must" have Alzheimer's.you don't. It's when you think you are perfectly normal walking down the street in your nightgown going to teach a class on bubblegum wrappers (or whatever) that you have a problem." My grandfather had it. It was horrible. He never knew he was deteriorating. He didn't think he was forgetful or doing anything weird. If you took him in the car (this was early in the disease) he would spit all over the car because his brain forgot how to swallow. He finally had to go into a nursing home (my grandmother could no longer take care of him herself and he no longer knew her) and he would walk down the halls and take his pants off and pee in the potted plants. They had to put his pants on him backwards. Very sad. Broke our hearts. He was a WWII hero.
there are different stages of Alzheimer's. In the early stages one can still function relatively normally. As the disease progresses symptoms increase and one will lose more and more of their memory which will in fact diminish capabilities

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