Diagnosis of Alzheimers Disease - Research Paper Example

? Alzheimer’s: According to Gowran  , Alzheimer’s disease is an extremely fatal disease in that it lacks a cure. The sole available treatment is for reduction of the symptoms intensity, but there is none for the curing or reversal of progression. It first discovery was by Doctor Alois Alzheimer in the year 1906 a German neuropathologist and psychiatrist hence the name of the disease. Alzheimer’s disease diagnosis is mostly in older people especially those aged about 65 years and above. Although this is true, the onset of less prevalent early Alzheimer’s can occur earlier in life. By the year 2006, there was a recorded number of 26.6 million sufferers of the disease in the whole world. Four years later in the year 2012 this number had risen by 10%. Introduction Alzheimer’s disease tends to arise and develop in remarkably different ways among different individuals. This is in terms of both the time frame and rate of progress of the disease. However, the disease does have various common symptoms among individuals. These symptoms range from short memory losses to loss of thinking abilities. Most of the early symptoms of the disease mistaken to be age related. The diagnosis for Alzheimer’s disease is through the conduction of tests that evaluate the persons thinking abilities, behavioral characters and a brain scan. Once one receives the diagnosis with the disease, the progression of the symptoms would include irritability, aggression, long term memory loss, confusion, and mood swings. The researched average life span of a person diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease is about seven years. More than seven percent of those people diagnosed with Alzheimer disease die within the next fourteen years after diagnosis. Until recently, more than one thousand conducted clinical trials so far during research, still lack success (Brookmeyer & Grays, 2009). The only advancement is the development of various ways to delay the symptoms such as mental stimulation and balanced dieting among others. This disease leads to incapacitation of the patient requiring full time care by the society. This affects many aspects of the society including physical, social and psychological determent. It is the most costly disease to society prompting various cultural beliefs, practices and reactions towards the disease. Discussion The cultural attitudes of people towards this disease are different and in most cases adverse and lead to neglect of the affected and condition itself. People ignore the presence of symptoms, and they may go off unrecognized. This calls for calls for research and development of plans to popularize and provide health care to such societies, both the affected and the unaffected (Boyles and Andrews, 2010). A selected population in Nyali, Mombasa is to be used in this case. This is a society that comprises of mixed races and communities. They interact in social and commercial fronts but share different cultural ideologies and beliefs. These beliefs cause the presence of some level of segregation within the various cultures which may sometimes tend to affect other sectors. These people live and interact within the same geographical region and face to the same environmental and situational effects. As a result of this, they interact within their daily activities and also with other common issues such as in solving an emergent problem. Though the population may be different ethnically, their subconscious faces the same environmental aspects. As such, part of their psychology thinks the same and views most circumstances in the same way, such as the Alzheimer disease. Interactions and communication both within and with the external societies has been simplified through the development in telecommunication but is still under the control of self benefit. This means that communications and interactions mostly base on what the parties stand to gain from the activity. As such, the onset of discoveries such as slowing advent of the Alzheimer disease is welcome to interaction from all societies. On the other hand, the sharing of problems and challenges such as dealing with diseases is not common (Hall, 2011). Some societies or groups may even blame others for the onset of such diseases and avoid them in fear of contamination. This population has a culture that believes that the Alzheimer disease is a genetic disease. That it is cause of the inheritance of a genetic combination at birth. This belief came by because most of the presumed causes of the disease are unproved. This belief has become a significant challenge in educating people of the society about Alzheimer’s disease and how to manage the condition. This has left the people to view the disease as a genetic misfortune that one has absolute no control over. Health care givers are often affected by various aspects of the society population. These issues include cultural beliefs of the people, religious affiliations, tensions within the population and composition of the population. Such issues can either support the health care givers in society or can be extremely indolent in care giving. Care giving to individuals is extremely crucial to their health. This includes preventive testing, diagnosing, and treatment where possible. Ethically, this can only be provided to individuals if they agree to it, in case of deadly diseases outbreaks, or in case they are too sick to give consent. As such one cannot diagnose people of Alzheimer’s disease if they convince themselves the symptoms are not because of the disease. Even if, the care giver is quite sure that a person is experiencing the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease, they can never care give to them without their consent (Giger and Davidhizar, 2011). The fact that there are many beliefs of other causes of the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease makes many people not believe in it and left out in care giving. Ethically, health practitioners cannot force health care on them no matter how sure they are of the symptoms they are experiencing. The trans-cultural nursing assessment tool is best for use in such a culturally diversified community. In societal care giving, the assessment steps in a nursing process are crucial for the inter-ethnic relationships between nurses and their patients. The nurses need to view them from the reality context in which they exist so as to understand the population’s culture. These entities include space, communication, social organization, biological variations, time and environmental control (Murray, 2010). Through the use of this model, nurses are able to communicate with the population. This includes mutual understanding in both verbal and non verbal forms of communication ensuring that there is friendly understanding between the two parties. The comfort level of people related to space needs to be observed. This entails that, in forms of privacy, touch, body space and congestion is crucial in making of patients comfortable and confident. People of same and different races vary in the level of cellular biology. They contain different enzymes, color and texture among others that react intensely differently to treatment. Proper research and understanding of such variations is crucial to health care in Alzheimer’s disease. Treatment, in comparison with time, is necessary to understand especially in the different nature of this aspect to different people. Some value past cultural remedies while others trust modern techniques and an understanding of both are necessary to provide care to both in good time. The social organizations within the society need to be considered in that the different classes expect to be treated differently for them to be comfortable and cooperative. The aspect of environmental control refers to the extent one can control nature, such as through care giving. Conclusion A merge of the population groups and care givers to provide community health care is the best way to incorporate this model. The incorporation of this model to health care requires that all the aspects discussed above are well integrated. First, it is crucial to understand the population during care giving. As such health centers require to be put up in the community, and they should be in the various sector groups. Practitioners need training in accordance with the different culture groups and even incorporate the natives into care giving through training. The different cultures should be catered for in the institutions, and their needs and practices accommodated that they are comfortable, and their trust gained. References Boyle, J., & Andrews, M. (2010). Trans-cultural Concepts in Nursing Care. CA, Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications. Brookmeyer, R., & Gray, S. (2009). Projections of Alzheimer's Disease in the United States and the Public Health Impact of Delaying Disease Onset. American Journal of Public Health. Giger, J., & Davidhizar, S. (2011). Trans-cultural Nursing: Assessment and Intervention. CA, Berkeley: University of California Press. Gowran, A. (2012). Alzheimer's Disease: Taking the Edge Off with Cannabinoids. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Hall, J. (2011). Can Alzheimer’s Disease be Prevented? New York: Oxford University Press. Murray, J. (2010). Cultural and Societal Views of Alzheimer’s Disease. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Read More