Brain Health and Memory Disorders

Mild cognitive Impairment (MCI) mainly affects older adults. People with MCI have trouble with cognitive skills, such as remembering or thinking. These problems are worse than the normal mental changes that may occur as a person grows older. But they are not as severe as those caused by dementia. They do not impair independence or day-to-day living. MCI has many different causes and can be an early stage of a progressive disorder.

Alzheimer's Disease (AD) is the most common form of dementia among older people. AD is a brain illness that usually occurs in older adults, but it can also happen as early as age 40. It is a progressive disease, which means it gets worse over time. Alzheimer's disease is caused by the build up of two proteins called amyloid beta protein and tau, forming structures called plaques and tangles. Nerve cells show progressive degeneration in the brain, resulting in memory loss and other symptoms of dementia.

Lewy Body Dementia (LBD) is a disease associated with abnormal deposits of a protein called alpha-synuclein in the brain. These deposits, called Lewy bodies, affect chemicals in the brain whose changes can lead to problems with thinking, movement, sleep, behavior and mood. Lewy body dementia is one of the most common causes of dementia. There are two diagnoses of LBD — dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB) and Parkinson's disease dementia.

Vascular cognitive impairment, also called vascular dementia, is the second most common form of dementia after Alzheimer's disease. It is caused when decreased blood flow damages brain tissue. Symptoms of vascular dementia may develop slowly, or they may develop after a stroke or major surgery, such as heart bypass surgery or abdominal surgery.

Aphasia is a language disorder caused by damage in the area of the brain that controls language expression and comprehension. Aphasia makes a person unable to communicate effectively with others. Although aphasia can occur after a stroke, progressive aphasia is not caused by strokes.  Most people with aphasia are in middle to old age.

Sometimes called Pick disease, Frontotemporal dementia (FTD) is a group of disorders that occur when nerve cells in the frontal and temporal lobes of the brain degenerate. This causes those areas of the brain to shrink and to lose their normal functions. FTD can affect behavior, personality, language and movement.

Subjective cognitive decline is self-reported confusion or memory problems that have been happening more often or getting worse in the past 12 months.

Normal pressure hydrocephalus occurs when excess cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) accumulates in the brain's ventricles, causing thinking and reasoning problems, difficulty walking, and loss of bladder control. It's called normal pressure hydrocephalus because despite the excess fluid, the CSF pressure is often normal when it is measured during a spinal tap.