Fast Five Quiz: Alzheimer's Disease Signs and Symptoms

Jasvinder P. Chawla, MD, MBA

February 22, 2022

The criteria for an AD diagnosis established by the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke and the Alzheimer's Disease and Related Disorders Association (now known as the Alzheimer's Association) in 2011 require a patient to have slowly progressive memory loss of insidious onset. Importantly, the patient must be fully conscious because the diagnosis cannot be made in the context of clouded consciousness or delirium.

It is also important to differentiate AD from other more abrupt diseases like vascular dementia. Both AD and frontotemporal dementia (of which primary progressive aphasia and frontal lobe dementia are major aspects) result in significant memory loss. However, unlike AD, frontotemporal dementia initially appears as gradually worsening aphasia over several years, and patients eventually exhibit progressive dementia.

Learn more about the clinical guidelines for diagnosis of AD.

1 2 3 4 5 6

Next Section

Any views expressed above are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect the views of WebMD or Medscape.

Cite this: Jasvinder P. Chawla. Fast Five Quiz: Alzheimer's Disease Signs and Symptoms - Medscape - Feb 22, 2022.

Comments

Commenting is limited to medical professionals. To comment please Log-in.

Comments on Medscape are moderated and should be professional in tone and on topic. You must declare any conflicts of interest related to your comments and responses. Please see our Commenting Guide for further information. We reserve the right to remove posts at our sole discretion.