Alzheimer's Disease

Ever since I was nine years old I have been interested in working with the elderly. I believe my passion started when I helped my mother take care of my grandmother that was dying of breast cancer. One area that always intrigues me is Alzheimer's Disease. It saddens me that people forget who their family members are, forget how to eat, forget how to walk, and even forget how to breathe. Even though this disease is so sad, I find it extremely interesting.

Early symptoms of Alzheimer's Disease are loss of recent memory, spatial disorientation and lessening of emotional responses. In the second stage higher learning functions deteriorate, the ability to read and write are lost, the person becomes confused and doesn't recognize family members. In the third stage the person can experience seizures and are unable to speak.

What I find interesting is what is actually happening in the brain to cause these things to happen to older people. What is believed to cause Alzheimer's Disease is atrophy of the brain. There is a loss of neurons, enlarged cerebral ventricles, neuritic plaques and neurofibrillary tangles form in the hippocampus and cerebral cortex, and there is a deficiency of acetylcholine-releasing neurons.

I found a very helpful website that shows in many different aspects how the brain changes that is suffering from Alzheimer's Disease. The link is: http://www.alz.org/braintour/alzheimers_changes.asp

Extra Post

This is my extra post to make up for one that was previously missed. I want to focus this post on the circulatory system. We have learned that there are many different functions of the circulatory system. Some of them include: brings blood containing nutrients, oxygen, and hormones to cells, transport wastes away from cells, fights infections, regulated body temperature, and helps stabilize pH concentration of bodily fluids. The circulatory system is made up of the heart, blood, arteries, veins, and capillaries.

The heart is a muscular pump which moves blood throughout the body and sits in a pericardial sac. There are three layers of the heart: the pericardium, myocardium, and endocardium. The pericardium surrounds the perimeter of the heard and is a protective sac of connective tissue. The myocardium is the muscle of the heart which is made up of  contracting cardiac muscle fibers. The endocardium is the inner surface of the myocardium. The heart has four chambers: two atria and two ventricles. The atria are the two upper chambers and then receive blood from veins and send blood to the ventricles. The ventricles are the two lower chambers and they receive blood from the artia and pump blood out through the arteries.

Since the flow of blood through the heart is an important process to understand, I found a video that helps explain each step of the process. The link is: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rj_qD0SEGGk