adminTawanda Mvere
IT is that time again when we commemorate World Mental Health Day.
The day, which is supported by the UN, is commemorated annually on the 10th of October. This means that today, Zimbabwe and other countries worldwide mark the day to raise public awareness about mental health issues.
The event promotes open discussions on illness, as well as investments in prevention and treatment services. This year’s unique theme is on mental health and old age.
Mental disorders affect nearly 12 percent of the world’s population – about 450 million or one out every four people around the world will experience a mental illness.
Mental health is described as a state of well-being in which people realise their own potential, can cope with normal life stresses, can work productively and can contribute to their community.
Mental health services lack human and financial resources in many countries, particularly low and middle income countries. Therefore, more funding is needed to promote mental health to increase people’s awareness of the issue.
Sadly, in Zimbabwe there is still a lot of stigma attached to mental health, with a lot of people still reluctant to access mental health medical services.
Let’s look at the mental health disorder known as dementia. Many would wonder what dementia is and how it relates to old age.
An otherwise perfect driver goes through a red traffic light, but insists it was green; a wife suffers a momentary inability to remember the littlest thing like writing her own name.
All brief lapses are often chalked up to stress, depression or a bad day, but for people in their 40s, 50s and early 60s they can be signs of something more serious, the early onset of dementia. The early onset of dementia is a form of mental disease that strikes people before the age of 65, but it is frequently misunderstood and written off by family members, even doctors, as some other ailment.
Dementia is a collection of symptoms that include decreased intellectual functioning that interferes with normal life functions and is usually used to describe people who have two or more major life functions impaired or lost such as memory language, perception, judgment or reasoning .
They may lose emotional and behavioural control, develop personality changes and or have problem-solving abilities reduced or lost.
Alzheimer’s disease (AD ) is the most common cause of dementia in people aged over 65 years with cause possibility related to amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles, almost all brain functions, including memory, movement, language, judgment, behaviour, and abstract thinking are eventually affected. Amyloid plaques refer to protein deposits that appear in the brains of Alzheimer’s disease patients. Alzheimer’s is a type of incurable dementia that typically affects adults over 65 years of age.
Vascular dementia is the most common cause of dementia caused by brain damage from cerebrovascular or cardiovascular problems (strokes) or other problems that inhibit vascular functions. Symptoms are similar to Alzheimer’s disease but personality and emotions are affected late in the disease.
Frontotemporal dementia is dementia linked to degeneration of nerve cells on the frontal and temporal brain lobes and some evidence for genetic factor (many have a family history of the diseases) symptoms in patients (usually aged 40 to 65) have judgment and social behaviour problems such as stealing, neglecting responsibilities, increased appetite, compulsive behaviour and eventual motor skills problems and memory loss.
HIV associated dementia is due to infection of the brain with HIV. Symptoms include impaired memory, apathy, social withdrawal, and concentration problems.
Huntington’s disease also causes dementia. It is a heredity disorder caused by a faulty gene and children of a person with the disorder have a 50 percent chance of getting the disease. Symptoms begin in 30 -40 year-old people with personality changes such as anxiety, depression and progress to show psychotic behaviour severe dementia and chorea –involuntary jerky, arrhythmic (lacking rhythm) movements of the body.
Other conditions that may cause dementia are reactions to medication, metabolic problems, nutritional deficiencies, poisoning, brain tumors, and anoxia (lack of oxygen) heart and lung problems.
All causes of dementia result from death and damage of nerve cells in the brain, genetics and possibly the formation of different types of inclusions in the brain cells are likely the major causes, although some researchers suggest that certain inclusions may be only be side effects of an underlying disorder.
Risk factors for dementia include advancing age, genetics (family history) smoking, alcohol use, high cholesterol, diabetes, mild cognitive impairment, and Down syndrome.
Dementia is diagnosed by using many methods such as patients medical and (family history ), physical examinations, neurological (of the nervous system) evaluations, cognitive and neurological testing, brain scans, mental status examinations, blood tests, psychiatric evaluations, and even some pre-symptomatic tests are available for some patients that may have a genetic link to dementia.
Most treatments for dementia will never stop, reverse or stop the disease. However, there are treatments and medications that may reduce the symptoms and slow the disease progressing. They include tight glucose control by persons with diabetes, intellectually stimulating activities, lowering cholesterol levels, regular exercise, education, and controlling inflammation of body tissues.
Let us commemorate the World Mental Health Day by wearing something with the colour yellow to help eradicate stigma around mental health.
Tawanda Mvere is a pastor and executive director of Christian Counseling and Depression Trust. The trust is a non-profit making organisation based in Bulawayo, whose primary purpose is to raise awareness on mental heath disorder as well as provide Christian counseling.
Online Reporter