Neurocognitive Disorder Explained: Does It Apply to You?

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Lisa, Hi everyone. Welcome back to the truth lies

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and Alzheimer's show. I'm Lisa Skinner, your host. Today, I

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want to talk about what a neurocognitive disorder really

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is, and it might actually surprise some of you that it

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does include other conditions besides Alzheimer's or some of

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these other brain diseases that cause dementia. So

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neurocognitive disorder? What does that mean? It's a general

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term that describes decreased mental function due to a medical

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disease other than a psychiatric illness. So it's not mental

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illness. This is neurocognitive disorders. Now, neurocognitive

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disorders are grouped into three subcategories, the first one is

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delirium, like a false belief, believing something's there.

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That's not like my grandmother believing that there were birds

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living in her mattress and that they would come out at night and

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peck at her face. That's an example of delirium or a false

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belief. It's different from a hallucination, where, when she

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was telling me, asking me if I saw the rats running around in

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her house, she literally thought she saw rats. That's the

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difference. That's a hallucination. The other

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subcategory for a neurocognitive disorder is what's called mild

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neurocognitive disorder, and the person may be experiencing some

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decreased mental function, but able to stay independent and do

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daily tasks. And the third subcategory is called major

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neurocognitive disorder, which is decreased mental function and

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loss of ability to perform your activities of daily living, your

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daily tasks. This is also called Dementia, and for those of you

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who are new to this program, let me just take a minute to explain

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the difference between Alzheimer's disease or one of

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the other 200 brain diseases that cause what we call

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dementia. So Alzheimer's disease, frontotemporal disease,

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Lewy Body disease, these are all brain diseases that cause very

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similar symptomology in people who have these brain diseases.

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The other thing that a lot of people aren't aware of, that I

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want to make sure that you understand, is that people can

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actually suffer from more than one brain disease

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simultaneously. A person can be experiencing Alzheimer's disease

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and, let's say vascular dementia at exactly the same time, but

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those two brain diseases could be damaging different parts of

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the brain at the same time. Now, when we use the term dementia,

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we're referring to the symptoms, the signs and the behaviors that

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are caused from the damage being done to the brain from the brain

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disease, dementia is not an actual disease. It's a broad

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term used to basically refer to the signs symptoms and behaviors

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that we see that are caused as a result of the damage being done

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to the brain. So it's a generic term, but it refers to the signs

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and the symptoms like we've all experienced this, sometimes we

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can't tell the difference between a cold and the flu, but

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we experience symptoms, so let's say we have the symptoms that

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are include a fever, Body aches, sneezing all the time. Now, what

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is this? Is this a cold, or is this the flu? Well, hopefully

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our doctor can tell us the difference, but the symptoms

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between colds and the flu often are overlapping and they are

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similar completely different diseases. So that's a good kind

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of analogy for understanding the difference between dementia and

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the actual disease. Is it's referring to the symptoms that

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we're experiencing now, some of the causes associated with

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neurocognitive disorder include. Brain injuries caused by trauma.

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Brain injuries are not actual diseases. They are caused by

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traumatic events. Traumatic injuries, it could include

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bleeding into the brain, which is also referred to as an

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intracerebral hemorrhage, or bleeding into the space around

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the brain. Sub arachnoid hemorrhage is what the medical

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term is for bleeding into the space around the brain. Or it

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could be a blood clot inside the skull, but it's outside the

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brain, and it's covering which may cause pressure on the brain,

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and that's referred to either a subdural hematoma or an epidural

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hematoma, or it can be caused by a concussion. It also these

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neurocognitive disorders can also be caused by a breathing

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condition. Many of us would never have associated that with

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neurocognitive impairment, and that would include having low

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oxygen in your body, or hypoxia, is the medical term for it, or

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high carbon dioxide levels in your body, that's the medical

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term for that. Is called hypercapnia. There are also

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cardiovascular disorders that can cause neurocognitive

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disorders and that includes in that category, dementia due to

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many strokes, also referred to as multi infarct dementia, heart

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infections such as endocarditis or myocarditis, having a stroke

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or having a mini stroke, also referred to as a TIA or a

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transient in ischemic attack, those can be the direct Causes

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of neurocognitive disorders. Then we have degenerative

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disorders, and these are your actual brain diseases, and there

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are about 200 known degenerative disorders, but let me just list

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a few of the more commonly known ones, beginning with Alzheimer's

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disease, also referred to as senile dementia, the Alzheimer's

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type. Fruits Feld Jacob disease is another one that is a little

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bit more common, diffuse Lewy Body disease. We're hearing more

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and more and more about Lewy Body disease. Hunting disease is

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a rare one, but we're hearing that term more often. My brother

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in law was one of my eight family members who actually

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passed away from Huntington's disease, normal pressure

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Hydrocephalus is another degenerative disorder,

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Parkinson's disease, that one's pretty well known and picks

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disease. There are autoimmune diseases that cause neuro

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cognitive disorders, and a lot of people don't make that

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association. So you can experience neurocognitive

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impairment from having multiple sclerosis or Ms. You can also

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experience neurocognitive disorder by having an autoimmune

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disease, such as autoimmune encephalitis, and then there's

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dementia due to metabolic causes. And this might surprise

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some of you, kidney diseases can lead to dementia, like symptoms,

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liver diseases, thyroid diseases, either hyper

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thyroidism or hypothyroidism. So either an underactive thyroid or

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an overactive thyroid vitamin deficiencies, such as a

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deficiency in vitamin B, 1b 12 or folate, can mimic the

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symptoms of dementia,

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the confusion, the behaviors, all the things that we see

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caused by an Alzheimer's disease or one of these other

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degenerative disorders. The difference is the dementia is

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due to metabolic causes. Death can be treated and possibly

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reversed. Where the degenerative disorders cannot, they're

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progressive, they get worse, and they eventually lead to death.

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Then there's drug and alcohol related conditions that can lead

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to neurocognitive disorders or impairment, and that would

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include alcohol withdrawal, state intoxication from drug or

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alcohol use medicine, effects such as corticosteroids,

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sedative hypnotics, anti histamines and antidepressants.

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There's also Wernicke Korsakoff syndrome, which is a long term

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effect of deficiency of thiamine or vitamin b1 and then

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withdrawal from medications such as sedative hypnotics or

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corticos steroids can also contribute to neurocognitive

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disorders, also included would be a sudden onset or long term

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infection like a urinary tract infection, is a good example

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blood poisoning, and that's what happens with urinary tract

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infections. It can get into the blood called septicemia, and

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just bring on dementia, like symptoms pretty quickly, but

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Alzheimer's disease and the other neurodegenerative

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syndromes or diseases don't bring on the symptoms quickly

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like that, but a urinary tract infection that gets into the

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blood system can but it's treatable with antibiotics. A

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brain infection such as encephalitis, meningitis is

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another one that's infection of the lining of the brain and the

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spinal cord that can bring on dementia like symptoms. Another

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one is called a prion infection, and an example is mad cow

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disease. And then late stage syphilis also mimics

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neurocognitive disorders and Lyme disease, too. Talked about

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that recently on a on another episode, additionally

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complications of cancer and cancer treatment with

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chemotherapy and radiation therapy to the brain can also

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lead to neurocognitive disorders and The related symptomology

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other conditions that may mimic neurocognitive disorder include

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depression, neurosis and psychosis. Some of the symptoms

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that can differ based on the disease, but in general,

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neurocognitive disorder causes agitation, confusion, long term

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loss of brain function, which includes mild cognitive

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impairment and or dementia and severe short term loss of brain

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function or delirium. There are tests that may include blood

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test, neuropsychological testing, an EEG, a head CT scan,

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a head MRI and or a lumbar puncture, which is taking fluid

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out of the spinal cap. It's called the Spinal Tap. Treatment

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depends on the underlying condition. Many conditions are

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treated mainly with rehabilitation and supportive

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care to help the person with activities lost due to areas

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where brain function is affected. Medications may be

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needed to reduce aggressive behaviors that can occur with

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some of these conditions. The Outlook or prognosis for some of

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these conditions are that some are short term and reversible,

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but unfortunately, many of these are long term and get worse over

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time, and they are not curable. Some of the possible

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complications are that people with neurocognitive disorder

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often lose the ability to interact with others or function

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on their own without needing help with some or all. Their

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activities of daily living. So it's recommended that you should

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contact your health care provider if you've already been

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diagnosed with neurocognitive disorder and you are uncertain

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about the exact type of disorder that's causing the symptoms that

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definitely needs to be assessed immediately. You are showing

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symptoms of a condition that I just mentioned. You have been

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diagnosed with neurocognitive disorder, and your symptoms are

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starting to worsen. Alternative names are organic mental

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disorder or organic brain syndrome. So hopefully you found

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some of this, not only informative and valuable, but

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surprising that so many things out there can mirror and do

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mirror the same or similar symptomology behavior, signs

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that we see with Alzheimer's disease and other brain

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diseases. I wanted to bring this to your attention, because the

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symptomology that we experience with Alzheimer's disease doesn't

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always mean it's going to end up as full blown dementia, that

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it's possible there's an under another underlying root cause

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that can be treated, can be reversed, can be cured. So be

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aware of that, because if somebody in your family, or

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somebody that you know all of a sudden starts showing these

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symptoms, that you're thinking, oh my gosh, this. This looks

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like it might be something like Alzheimer's disease, not always

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the case. Take that person, have that person go for a full

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assessment with your primary care physician, because it just

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might be something that is treatable and reversible and

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curable, and it's not going to be a long term, progressive

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situation like we see with brain diseases. So that's what I

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wanted to bring for you today to this episode of the truth, lies

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and Alzheimer's again. I'm Lisa Skinner, your host, and I will

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be back next week with another new episode of the truth, lies

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and Alzheimer's disease, bringing you more helpful, more

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valuable, more usable, information that'll hopefully

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help you live better, happier lives until next time. Have a

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good rest of your week. Thanks for being here with us today,

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and we'll see you next week. Bye, bye.