welcome to the organic green doctor blog

i am a family physician who was diagnosed with
early mild cognitive impairment(mci) amnestic type on december 21, 2010
this is a precursor to alzheimers disease
because of this diagnosis i have opted to stop practicing medicine
this blog will be about my journey with this disease
please feel free to follow me along this path
i will continue blogging on organic gardening, green living,
solar power, rainwater collection, and healthy living
i will blog on these plus other things noted to be interesting

Friday, April 26, 2019

alzheimers news-getting scammed is bad news

ALZHEIMERS NEWS-GETTING SCAMMED IS BAD NEWS
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last monday when i went to the follow up at ucla with my biogen aducanumab visit where they did the memory testing and lots of blood like 10 vials worth and a neurological exam
i was asked by my neurologist that i see for my meds who also is the director of some of the research studies at ucla including this one im in the biogen aducanumab one
if i would mind reading this booklet from the california alzheimers disease centers that they wrote that will be given to the states primary care doctors to help in evaluating patients with memory loss

she said since you were a practicing family doctor for years we would like your insight
yes i said i would be glad to read it and make comments on it
i would have been glad to have one of these when i was in practice

in fact
the last few years in austin i was on a committee with several neurologists that was doing a similar project for the state of texas
i was the primary care person and also the patient on the committee
my insight was different from the specialists
i left the state before it was completed
so
i am glad to give my thoughts on the pamphlet for primary care doctors
thinking
like a primary care doctor
and
like a patient with the diagnosis


when my mom was older and family starting helping her some with her checkbook it was noticed that she was writing a lot of checks to folks who were supposedly charities like veterans or childrens homes etc

one thing i did was i took all that mail from them she was getting and did a change of address to my home address
that helped some in slowing down the checks she wrote to them
these charities although they were supposedly legit seemed to prey on older folks

so this week when this article which i will link here floated across my alzheimers news feed
it made me think about my mom and her being taken advantage of by these folks

so
if you have a family member who is being taken advantage of
read this article or my summary
it may be a warning sign of memory loss in your loved one

they identified 935 elderly folks without alzheimers
after 6 years 151 of these elderly folks or 16.1% developed alzheimers disease
a low scam score means they got scammed easily

a low scam score was associated with an increase risk of mild cognitive impairment and a greater risk for alzheimers disease

in the development of alzheimers you go through these three stages
-prealzheimers with no symptoms
-mild cognitive impairment with mild symptoms some call this one early alzheimers
-alzheimers disease with full blown symptoms

so
its not normal to be scammed easily when you get older its abnormal

if your loved ones are getting scammed thats a red flag for the possibility of memory issues
consider having them checked for memory loss
ie you can have them do a medicare wellness exam which should do a simple memory screen
or have them see their primary care provider for a memory check

just be aware is what im saying
if they get scammed thats a sign

wish i had known this 20 years ago

the organicgreen doctor

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