ALZHEIMER’S DISEASE: A COMPREHENSIVE REVIEW

Alzheimer disease (AD) is the most common cause of dementia which affects more than 44 million individuals worldwide. It has been noticed that there is only symptomatic treatments are available to treat AD, but no cure exists. It is a neurodegenerative disease characterized by Alois Alzheimer’s in 1906, and neuro-degenerative diseases are one of the major concerns facing by the modern health care system. It is a multifarious complex disease which pathology not clearly understood but it is generally characterized by neuronal damage, memory dysfunction, etc. main pathological hallmark factor for Alzheimer disease is deposition of amyloid-β (Aβ) plaques around the neurons, neurofibrillary tangles, and a decrease in acetylcholine concentration and some other neurotransmitter dysregulation. Different types of risk factors like oxidative stress, obesity, diabetes, hypertension, air pollution, smoking, hyper cholesterolemia etc. have a very significant role in the development of AD and in the development of its preventive measures. Physical exercise and nutritional factors have been shown as protective measures for it and help in its prevention. For the diagnosis of it, we use cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers and positron emission tomography etc. Currently, there are two conventional pharmacotherapies exist for AD which is approved by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) are respectively- acetylcholinesterase inhibitors- tacrine, donepezil, rivastigmine, galantamine and N-methyl-D-aspartate glutamate antagonist (NMDA)-memantine.