Dementia

Dementia is a loss of brain function that interferes with routine daily activities. It affects memory, language, and making decisions, which can also impact social behaviors, mood, and personality.

Dementia can be caused by many diseases, but Alzheimer’s disease is the most common one among older adults. Like Huntington’s disease and Parkinson’s disease, Alzheimer’s is a degenerative disease that destroys nerve cells in the brain over time.

Symptoms

Symptoms of dementia include confusion, memory loss, and not being able to remember simple instructions, names, directions, or recent events. Memory loss is often associated with dementia, but not all memory loss is caused by or related to it. There is no cure for dementia, unless it’s caused by treatable conditions such as alcohol or drug abuse, hormone imbalances, and severe depression.

Brain Aging & Memory Clinic

UAB Medicine’s Brain Aging & Memory Clinic was created to care for people with memory problems, thinking problems, or other complex issues related to degeneration in the brain. Located on the fifth floor of UAB Hospital-Callahan Eye, the clinic uses a team approach that includes neurologists, nurse practitioners, and various types of nurses, with support from pharmacy specialists, social workers, and other health care professionals. This clinic’s goal is to maximize the well-being of patients, using medications as well as non-medical strategies.

Each clinic patient is assigned a physician and a nurse practitioner. They begin with a full patient history and mental testing, which may be followed by laboratory tests, imaging studies (like CT, MRI, or PET scans), and more detailed mental assessments called neuropsychological testing. Doctors use these test results to help create care plans. Patients also may be referred to experts in other areas, such as psychiatrists, psychologists, sleep specialists, and pain management specialists.

UAB Medicine is a major center for research, so our doctors help conduct studies to learn more about treating and managing memory disorders. This means that our patients may have access to treatments not available at other medical centers.

To make an appointment with the Brain Aging & Memory Clinic, please call 205-801-8986 or request an appointment online.