How Alzheimer's Changed My Family

In February of 2000, I lost my grandmother to Alzheimer's disease. She was diagnosed with the disease just less than two years prior to her death. Throughout that time, I watched changes in my grandmother that made her seem like an entirely different woman to me. She gradually began losing her short-term memory and we began to see signs of her long-term memory degrading too. It began to get harder and harder to take her out into public without being afraid of what would happen next. Her emotions would fluctuate with the changing of each minute it seemed. Physically she became weaker and weaker and would often scare us with falling while she would be walking. Eventually she had to be moved into the

I chose to read Still Alice by Lisa Genova for this critical book review. I chose this book because I have a strong interest in dementia and Alzheimer’s disease. I also work with clients who are living with dementia and I can see how much of an impact that has on both my clients and their families. We hear stories about Alzheimer’s disease from doctors or caregivers all the time, but it is so rare to get to learn about the disease straight from the source, or straight from the person actually living through the progression of the disease.

This review aims to explain the story of Still Alice, how she was diagnosed as having Alzheimer’s Disease and how her life changed drastically.

This has been the most interesting book I have read because the irony shown in this book as well as the emotion I felt throughout reading this was different from when I read other books. As a Harvard professor of psychology, it’s ironic how Alzheimer’s takes parts of her psychology. In addition, while reading Alice’s story, I felt connected to her and wanted to support her during her struggle with Alzheimer’s. My sympathy towards Alice, as many people in the book felt, taught me how someone in her shoes would

A more common but still relatively rare disorder, early onset Alzheimer’s is portrayed in Still Alice through interactions with Alice’s family and her eventual decline in functionality. Alice was a professor who taught at Columbia University and the first symptom she shows is the losing of her train of thought while

After Alzheimer's is diagnosed in a parent, or other elderly family member, the caregiver has the task of deciding what the best form of care for the patient is. In order to do this they have to fully understand what the disease is, and

Alzheimer's disease is a familiar sight to me. I had a sad experience during my work as a nurse in my country Colombia and Spain with Alzheimer disease patients. Day by day I came to know each patient’s story because every day they were living the moment without remember the last minute. This is also what happened to Lisa Genova’s novel Still Alice. The protagonists is a 50 year old woman, a very well organized, efficient, highly-educated, and smart Harvard professor, wife of a successful man, and the mother of three grown children, who has diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. People have learned about the progression of Alice’s disease through her reactions, so feeling what she feels- a

Alice likes to spend time on her own and to run all over the city. After that the doctors discovered she had Alzheimer´s disease, then the whole plot tells us what is happening with her during the disease.

Still Alice, a film adapted from the novel Still Alice, portrays the progression of dementia through Alice Howland, a linguistics professor, wife, and mother of three. According to the Mayo Clinic (2016), “dementia describes a group of symptoms affecting memory, thinking and social abilities severely enough to interfere with daily functioning”. More specifically, Alice is diagnosed with early-onset familial Alzheimer's disease due to her age and genetics. Still Alice includes many examples in Alice’s deteriorating episodic, semantic, skill, and working memory. Though Alice uses strategies to fight the deterioration, the Alzheimer's eventually rids her of any form of memory.

The topic of this article is about the effects that Alzheimer’s has on the patients, family members/caregivers. I believe there is a grave importance in this topic to help understand the effects of this disease and possibly help farther research. This might bring a few questions to the front of this discussion. How the relationship is after a patient is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s? How does this effect the family members/caregivers? What symptoms do family members experience with Alzheimer’s patients? What factors in life play a role in developing this disease? This paper will explore these questions with the respect of these news articles.

“Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a slowly progressive disease of the brain that is characterized by impairment of memory and eventually by disturbances in reasoning, planning, language, and perception.” (Howard Crystal) In Health 1000 we were asked to read the book Still Alice. I have never dealt with or have done any study on Alzheimer’s disease before reading this book. After finishing this book it has really opened my eyes to how bad of a disease and how it cripples the mind. I never imagined the effect of this disease on a patient and the patient family. This book is about a upper middle aged lady named Alice who is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease, and how she and her family learn how to deal with disease. One of the things this book

Every year, the number of people with Alzheimer's doubles every 5 years beyond the age of 65, and as of 2013, 13 million Americans were suffering from this disease (CDC). Still Alice, written by Lisa Genova is about a woman in her fifties who is diagnosed with early onset Alzheimer's disease. She is a very successful woman with three kids and a loving husband. She had a great career as a cognitive psychology professor at Harvard, but that came to an end when this disease took over her brain. As the story reads on you learn about her thoughts and overcome her hardships along with her as she fights against this disease.

This experience scared me to my core considering that that could be the future for not only my grandmother, but grandparents everywhere. Seeing that made me realize that no one else deserves to deal with this disease. My life’s mission is to find treatments and possibly a cure for Alzheimer’s. That is why I wish to take part in the NINDS program; it provides the unique opportunity to not only conduct research on neurological disorders, but also to learn about how clinicians work with patients on a daily basis to put into practice the ideas that research brings

     It is inevitable that eventually each of us will grow old and begin to face more and more health problems as our age rises. Elderly people are challenged by many illnesses and diseases that unfortunately, are incurable. One disease that becomes more common as people age is Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimer’s a common cause and a form of dementia and can severely damage a patient’s cognitive functions and can ultimately cause death. Living with Alzheimer’s disease can be saddening for both the sufferer and the family. Family and friends will find it very hard to cope when a loved one begins slipping away and losing memory of who they are.

Still Alice (Genova, 2009) is a captivating debut novel about a 50-year-old woman’s sudden decline into early onset Alzheimer’s disease. The book is written by first time author Lisa Genova, who holds a PH.D in neuroscience from Harvard University. She’s also an online columnist for the national Alzheimer’s association. Her other books include Left Neglected and Love Anthony. She lives with her husband and two children in Cape Cod.