Advertisement - Click to support our sponsors.

Expert: isle cases
of Alzheimer’s
to increase

The state's attraction
to retirees and long life
expectancy are cited

How to get help

By Helen Altonn
Star-Bulletin

Hawaii has about 17,000 residents with Alzheimer's disease and many more will be afflicted in coming years because of the state's long life expectancy and attraction to retirees.

This was pointed out today by Dr. Steven DeKosky, an Alzheimer's specialist, who also cited reasons for hope that the disease might eventually be prevented and cured.

DeKosky, chairman of the national Alzheimer's Association's Medical and Scientific Advisory Committee and director of the University of Pittsburgh Alzheimer's Disease Research Center, helped organize a World Alzheimer Congress last week in Washington, D.C. He is here until Tuesday giving talks at hospitals and to the Aloha Chapter of the Alzheimer's Association.

About 20 million people worldwide have Alzheimer's, including about 4 million in the United States, according to estimates.

Despite growing numbers of Alzheimer's patients here and around the world with people living longer, DeKosky said scientists are optimistic.

Research findings indicate a vaccine, and new types of medications may help to prevent and treat the disease, he said.

However, he said, "We have further to go to convince physicians this is a disease they need to focus on and understand. One reason I'm out here is to tell them, whether they like it or not, more (patients) will be showing up in their offices."

DeKosky cited two pieces of good news involving medications for Alzheimer's, a progressive, degenerative disease of the brain and the most common form of dementia.

Although designed to treat memory function, it turns out the medications also have a calming effect on patients with behavioral disturbances, he said. They appear to help maintain or prevent a decline in a patient's daily living activities, he said.

"We would like more powerful ones and ones that work in concert with these medications," he said.

Medications also are being found that may help to stop the Alzheimer's epidemic expected in the next 20 to 40 years as baby boomers reach 65 -- the age of risk, he said.

Hawaii, the state with the longest life expectancy and a "favored retirement target," will have an even worse problem than many areas, DeKosky said.

On the positive side, however, medications are being found that will block changes in the brain linked to Alzheimer's, he said. Human safety trials have been approved by the Food and Drug Administration on the first of those drugs, he said.

DeKosky said many physicians have problems with Alzheimer's because there weren't any medications when they were in training and they don't understand that it is a treatable disease.

Also, he said, "You can't stop it in its tracks. It involves something more complicated than talking to a patient ... and it's a moving target. It will continue to change." Patients must be watched carefully and doctors have to deal with family members as well, he said.

Alzheimer's isn't a normal part of aging, says Patricia Lanoie Blanchett, chapter president and director of the Geriatric Medicine Program at the University of Hawaii's John A. Burns School of Medicine.

"I have been impressed how understandably terrified many people are of the possibility that they will get Alzheimer's, lose their dignity and pose a terrible burden on their families as they get older," she said. "We could do a lot to make old age so much better if we could eliminate this scourge."

 | | |

How to get help for Alzheimer's Families and caregivers of Hawaii patients with Alzheimer's can get help from the Aloha Chapter, which has offices on Oahu, Maui and the Big Island. It provides home visits, operates a "Safe Return" wanderer's registry, maintains a lending library, conducts workshops, professional training and community presentations and coordinates several neighborhood support groups. It has a statewide 24-hour helpline: 591-0090 on Oahu; 893-2152 on Maui, and 1-877-43-aloha or 1-877-432-5042, toll-free, from the neighbor Islands.