Medications and Alzheimer's Disease

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Senior Care Resources
Medications and Alzheimer’s Disease

Learning about AD

Warning Signs

What are the warning signs for Alzheimer’s disease?

Since Alzheimer’s disease is not a normal part of aging, its signs cannot be explained by “old age” or the general forgetfulness one experiences from time to time.

Instead, Alzheimer’s disease increasingly interferes with a loved one’s normal day-to-day abilities and activities.

According to the Alzheimer’s Association, the ten most common warning signs of Alzheimer’s disease are:

	Sign	Example
1.	Memory loss that affects job skills	frequent forgetfulness, unexplained confusion
2.	Difficulty performing familiar tasks	forgetting to serve a meal or that they prepared it at all
3.	Problems with language	forgetting simple words or substituting inappropriate words so that sentences become difficult to understand
4.	Disorientation to time and place	getting lost in familiar places or not knowing where they are or how to get home
5.	Poor or decreased judgment	dressing inappropriately for the occasion or the season
6.	Problems with abstract thinking	difficulty recognizing numbers or performing basic calculations
7.	Misplacing things	placing objects in wrong places, such as putting keys in the freezer
8.	Changes in mood or behavior	rapid mood swings for no reason
9.	Changes in personality	changes in a person, such that a generally calm person becomes angry or suspicious
10.	Loss of initiative	decreased interest or involvement with usual tasks

In general, the signs of Alzheimer’s disease do not appear until years after the disease process has already started.