Introduction

The goal of the Education section is to provide education on the many diseases that cause cognitive and movement disorders, and on the types of cognitive functions that they affect.

We have tried to structure these pages so that they can provide useful information for patients and their families, as well as health care providers at all levels of training. Many terms might be unfamiliar. Where the icon (for Glossary) appears, we have provided the definition to that word.

The education section is divided into three areas.... Discussions on:

1) Diseases
2) Topics
3) Treatment

The term “dementia” is a commonly used term, described as follows...

What is dementia? What are the different types of dementia?
The word dementia is used to describe the condition where one has a progressive decline in memory and other cognitive functions that results in a change in the ability to conduct one's usual activities.

There are many causes of dementia. Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause in older adults. Some other diseases that cause dementia include frontotemporal dementia, vascular dementia, and dementia with Lewy Bodies. Each of these diseases can be recognized by the specific effects they have on cognitive and motor function.

Diseases
Many types of diseases cause dementia. Information about diseases are found in the Disease section of Education.

diseases compared — with relation to age
Below illustrates that these diseases affect people at different ages. For people who are age 65 and older with a degenerative dementia, the most common disorders are Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia. In people who are under 65, frontotemporal dementia and Huntington's disease are also common.

Topics
Diseases, and even normal aging, can affect many different types of cognitive and motor functions. This section discusses some of these functions affected by neurodegenerative disorders.

Treatment
This section introduces treatments available.