Memory Care San Marcos Texas

More and more people are needing to step up and take on the role of providing care for familiy members who have developed Alzheimer's Disease or other forms of dementia. These same people are often still employed and need to remain employed in order to earn a living, keep their health insurance or any of a number of other reasons.

Today, I came across lifemeetswork.com, a website that provides information to employers and empoyees to assist in embracing flexible work.  Since many family caregivers struggle trying to balance work and commitment to their caregiving roles, it seemed appropriate to share this great resource. 

Take a look at this short video which presents the case for Flex work.  You may find it helpful if you need to negotiate with an employer in order to be BOTH an contributing employee AND a devoted caregiver.

I'm sitting here remembering the way back when. Way back when I didn't know anything about Alzheimer's. Remembering how I stayed up until 1, 2, 3 AM reading everything I could find that might help me care for my mother, Dotty.
By Bob DeMarco
Alzheimer's Reading Room

Back in those days Dotty would get up at 7 or 7:30 in the morning, and still be up at 11 PM. So I had to do my research in the early AM.

My very first decision was that I needed to take my then 88 year old mother into the gym for some real exercise. Dotty had never been in the gym in her life.

Short version. Time to go the gym Dotty. Dotty says, I'm not going to the GD gym. Dotty in the car on the way to the gym, I'm not getting out of the car when we get there. Dotty on the way into the gym, I'll go in but I am not going to do anything. This along with some choice curse words and the usual, kiss my ass.

By the time we were into the gym, Dotty wouldn't talk to me, she wouldn't look at me, and was meaner than a junkyard dog (this did change over time).

On the way out of the gym, Dotty would be standing up taller, walking more confidently, and would be smiling. As it turned out, this was not the cure. But, the effect of the gym usually lasted a few hours before the hellishness of it all set back in. I cannot tell you how much I enjoyed life during those few hours.

It didn't stop there. I became more and more determined to find the way(s) to turn those few hours into an entire day. It wasn't easy, it took years, but I did it. You can too.

I slowly but surely became convinced about how you go about doing good caregiving.

Now I am becoming convinced that while you can't stop Alzheimer's, can't prevent Alzheimer's, you can delay the onset of Alzheimer's.

Who knows, maybe you delay Alzheimer's and get lucky -- you die before it gets bad because you are older when AD strikes hard. Don't cringe at me. This is reality right now.

Pay attention to the research below, it might make a difference in your life.

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Lifelong brain-stimulating habits linked to lower Alzheimer’s protein levels
A new study led by researchers at the University of California, Berkeley, provides even more reason for people to read a book or do a puzzle, and to make such activities a lifetime habit.

Brain scans revealed that people with no symptoms of Alzheimer’s who engaged in cognitively stimulating activities throughout their lives had fewer deposits of beta-amyloid, a destructive protein that is the hallmark of the disease.

While previous research has suggested that engaging in mentally stimulating activities – such as reading, writing and playing games – may help stave off Alzheimer’s later in life, this new study identifies the biological target at play. This discovery could guide future research into effective prevention strategies.

“These findings point to a new way of thinking about how cognitive engagement throughout life affects the brain,” said study principal investigator Dr. William Jagust, a professor with joint appointments at UC Berkeley’s Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, the School of Public Health and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. “Rather than simply providing resistance to Alzheimer’s, brain-stimulating activities may affect a primary pathological process in the disease. This suggests that cognitive therapies could have significant disease-modifying treatment benefits if applied early enough, before symptoms appear.”

An estimated 5.4 million Americans live with Alzheimer’s disease, but the numbers are growing as baby boomers age. Between 2000 and 2008, deaths from Alzheimer’s increased 66 percent, making it the sixth-leading killer in the country. There is currently no cure, but a draft of the first-ever National Alzheimer’s Plan, released this week, revealed that the U.S. government is aiming for effective Alzheimer’s treatments by 2025.

The new study, to be published Monday, Jan. 23, in the Archives of Neurology, puts the spotlight on amyloid – protein fibers folded into tangled plaques that accumulate in the brain. Beta-amyloid is considered the top suspect in the pathology of Alzheimer’s disease, so finding a way to reduce its development has become a major new direction of research.

The researchers note that the buildup of amyloid can also be influenced by genes and aging – one-third of people age 60 and over have some amyloid deposits in their brain – but how much reading and writing one does is under each individual’s control.

“This is the first time cognitive activity level has been related to amyloid buildup in the brain,” said study lead author Susan Landau, research scientist at the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute and the Berkeley Lab. “Amyloid probably starts accumulating many years before symptoms appear. So it’s possible that by the time you have symptoms of Alzheimer’s, like memory problems, there is little that can be done to stop disease progression. The time for intervention may be much sooner, which is why we’re trying to identify whether lifestyle factors might be related to the earliest possible changes.”

The researchers asked 65 healthy, cognitively normal adults aged 60 and over (average age was 76) to rate how frequently they participated in such mentally engaging activities as going to the library, reading books or newspapers, and writing letters or email. The questions focused on various points in life from age 6 to the present.

The participants took part in extensive neuropsychological testing to assess memory and other cognitive functions, and received positron emission tomography (PET) scans at the Berkeley Lab using a new tracer called Pittsburgh Compound B that was developed to visualize amyloid. The results of the brain scans of healthy older individuals with various levels of lifetime cognitive activity were compared with those of 10 patients diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and 11 healthy people in their 20s.

The researchers found a significant association between higher levels of cognitive activity over a lifetime and lower levels of beta-amyloid in the PET scans. They analyzed the impact of other factors such as memory function, physical activity, self-rated memory ability, level of education and gender, and found that lifelong cognitive engagement was independently linked to amyloid deposition.

Notably, the researchers did not find a strong connection between amyloid deposition and levels of current cognitive activity alone.

“What our data suggests is that a whole lifetime of engaging in these activities has a bigger effect than being cognitively active just in older age,” said Landau.

The researchers are careful to point out that the study does not negate the benefits of kicking up brain activity in later years.

“There is no downside to cognitive activity. It can only be beneficial, even if for reasons other than reducing amyloid in the brain, including social stimulation and empowerment,” said Jagust. “And actually, cognitive activity late in life may well turn out to be beneficial for reducing amyloid. We just haven’t found that connection yet.”

Other study authors include researchers from UC San Francisco’s Memory and Aging Center and Department of Neurology, and Rush University Medical Center’s Alzheimer’s Disease Center in Chicago.

The National Institutes of Health and the Alzheimer’s Association helped support this research.

http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2012/01/23/engaged-brain-amyloid-alzheimers/

More Insight and Advice for Caregivers      

• How Alzheimer's Spreads Throughout the Brain
• Test Your Memory for Alzheimer's (5 Best Self Assessment Tests)
• What is Alzheimer's Disease?
• What is Dementia?
• What’s the Difference Between Alzheimer’s Disease and Dementia
• Communicating in  Alzheimer's World
• How the Loss of Memory Works in Alzheimer’s Disease, and How Understanding This Could Help You
• Learning How to Communicate with Someone Suffering From Alzheimer's Disease
• Alzheimer's World -- Trying to Reconnect with Someone Suffering from Alzheimer's Disease
• Does the Combination of Aricept and Namenda Help Slow the Rate of Decline in Alzheimer's Patients
• Driving with Alzheimer's Can Mean Death
• About the Alzheimer's Reading Room

Original content Bob DeMarco, the Alzheimer's Reading Room

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