Diagnosis and Treatment of Alzheimer’s Disease in Elderly and Senile Age

Abstract

The article deals with the important issue of the diagnosis and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease in the elderly and senile-aged. The disease is viewed as an aging-associated pathological state and the main cause of senile dementia. Notwithstanding, it is not particularly commonly diagnosed in Russia as compared with dementia, for example, of vascular origin. The reason for this appears to be not only the difficulties of in-vivo diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease but, above all, the multiplicity of pathological processes characteristic of the elderly and senile-aged. A large number of these pathologic processes, including Alzheimer’s disease, can cause increasing cognitive disorders. Under this condition, dementia is already considered a multifactorial disease, even in cases in which Alzheimer’s disease is the leading factor. This standpoint further requires the expansion of the diagnostic search, even in cases of full confidence in the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease in the elderly and senile-aged, to determine the possible role of other pathological processes in the origin and development of dementia. Ultimately, in light of the limited opportunities for treatment of Alzheimer’s disease, this will help in the selection of treatment methods to reduce the role of other etiological and pathogenic moments in the development of dementia of mixed genesis in the elderly and senile.