Confessions of a Jersey Girl has a post about an interesting Alzheimer’s research fundraiser. You register with the Alzheimer’s Association to throw a dinner party where the attendees donate at least $150 for research. Sounds like a great way to have an evening out, learn more about Alzheimer’s and help a worthy cause. I just may have to throw a dinner party myself.
In the meantime, though, I am hosting two crafty fundraisers. The first is a charm swap where everyone sends in 7 charms and gets 7 back. I am attaching my charms to a bracelet and auctioning them off on eBay. If you want to get in on the action, you have until October 5th to send me your 7 charms and postage to receive 7 charms back.
The other swap I am doing is a fat book of 16 pages for 15 pages. The extra page goes into a fat book that will be auctioned off on eBay. For details about signing up for this swap, which is due to me by November 15th, see my Stamping Mad blog.
I recently received a copy of Widow Words: 100 Simple Pieces of Advice from Another Widow
by Marcia Curran and thought I’d share my thoughts about the book with you. This little book was written by a widow who wanted to share advice with newly widowed women. These one hundred pieces of advice are deceptively simple and short. You can tell that the book was written by someone who had experienced the grief of losing a husband first hand, which I think is extremely important. I know that my grandmother could have really used this book.
A few of the pieces of advice you can find in “Widow Words” are:
- It’s ok to cry every day for months.
- It’s normal to think, But no one really understands what it’s like.
- Investigate all funny noises in your home.
I like that the entries are fairly short. Some are only a few words, but even the longest piece of advice is only a few paragraphs.
You may remember me talking about microchipping for Alzheimer’s patients. Well, ABC News says:
For families of the nearly 5 million Americans currently living with Alzheimer’s disease, keeping their loved ones safe is a major concern.
In response to such concerns, a Florida-based company has developed an FDA-approved microchip that can be implanted in an Alzheimer’s patient’s arm, allowing critical medical details to be accessed instantly.
This article by the University of Utah talks about a badly needed change in the way Alzheimer’s is diagnosed. The author points out that current guidelines are quite out of date:
In a commentary on proposed new diagnostic criteria published in the same issue, Foster writes that advances in imaging technology and genetics, combined with greater understanding of the disease, now make it possible to identify Alzheimer’s even before dementia develops. Dementia is a symptom, and Alzheimer’s disease is only one of the many causes of dementia.
You’ve tried to avoid it, but finally the inevitable has happened. You’ve married, changed jobs, or found a house with a one floor layout. Now, you have to move the person with Alzheimer’s that you are caring for to a new home. How do you move with an Alzheimer’s patient?
Well, as you know, the best thing is to stay put. Failing that, you need to try to avoid changing routines as much as possible. If you aren’t moving far, try moving the rest of the house and getting everything organized before moving the patient’s room. Then, have the patient sit in a familiar chair. Put on a favorite show or familiar tune to mask some of the noise and confusion. Then, have the patient’s room moved and reassembled. Be sure to arrange it look as much like the old room as possible.
If you are traveling a long way, you may not be able to set things up this way. For a long distance move, have the movers pack the Alzheimer’s patient’s room last, so that you can pull it out first when the van arrives at its destination. Don’t pack the room while the patient is sitting in it. Move him or her to a quiet, familiar area. If the whole house is in an uproar, go for a drive while you pack the room or take a walk in the back yard.
Don’t be surprised if your loved one is aggitated and upset during and after the move. Even if everything looks like it is the same, it isn’t and he or she will sense that.
Science Daily has published an article linking glaucoma and Alzheimer’s:
UK scientists have shown for the first time that key proteins involved in Alzheimer’s disease are also implicated in glaucoma, the major cause of irreversible blindness worldwide.
One good thing about this? Drugs that have been developed to treat Alzheimer’s are also proving to work on glaucoma.
I was reading an article recently on multitasking and realized that it may be something good for most of us, but not for Alzheimer’s patients. It is hard enough to get dressed or eat breakfast without thinking about the next thing on the agenda, or, even worse, trying to get dressed and eat breakfast at the same time. Sometimes, it is difficult to remember that Mom or Dad can’t handle deciding on a trip to the store or the park while she or he is just sitting there eating. It can be really frustrating to realize that even simple multitasking can be too much, but what can you do if a brain simply can’t handle all that mental juggling we take for granted in our own lives?
Multipurpose Rooms
Thinking about multitasking made me think about something else: our tendency to have rooms with many functions. To minimize confusion, each area in the house should have a specific job. For example, the kitchen should be for preparing and eating food, not for creating crafts or wrapping gifts. Imagine wondering into the kitchen and eating that stuff on the plate, only to taste…fun foam and glue.
Of course, if the Alzheimer’s patient has been crafting at the kitchen table for years, you don’t want to change established routines. It is just important to avoid making new and confusing changes. Laundry rooms turning into potting areas, sun rooms becoming the dogs’ bedroom, etc. are all things we take for granted as we expand our interests and repurpose rooms. However, for an Alzheimer’s patient, they can just be another confusing thing in a frustrating world.
According to Diabetes Health:
Diabetes and pre-diabetes are associated with a seventy-five percent increased risk of Alzheimer’s disease.
…brain scans of insulin-resistant adults reveal reduced glucose metabolism in certain brain regions; the pattern is identical to that seen in people who get Alzheimer’s years down the road.
What does this mean? If you have diabetes, make sure you work hard to manage it properly. Also, there will probably be more work on making people less resistant to insulin, since the study showed that diabetics who received treatment to make them sensitive to insulin were able to improve their memories.
I saw three news articles this morning where authorities are searching for Alzheimer’s patients who have wondered away. Of course, this brings up the debate again - should Alzheimer’s patients be handed a microchip along with their diagnosis? I personally don’t like the thought of injecting someone who can’t rationally give consent for the procedure, but if my loved one was lost and freezing on a cold winter night, perhaps I’d feel differently.
The problem to me is that a microchip can be read by identity thieves, it can be tracked by people who are nosy or collecting information on your movements that you don’t want them collecting and it does seem a very alien idea in a country that is based on freedom. Any technology that has the potential to be misused by power hungry people makes me a bit nervous. So, to microchip or not to microchip? What do you think?
I don’t know if you recall the initial Ampakine trials, which were halted because the government didn’t like the looks of some of the data relating to animal research. Well, the drug seemed promising, so I guess it is good news that the trials are starting again, although I’d like to hear a bit more about why the government stopped the trial in the first place and why they then decided to go ahead with it.
