A comprehensive, holistic and cutting-edge approach to the treatment and prevention of Alzheimer’s Disease.

What Is Alzheimer’s disease?  Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, a general term for memory loss and other intellectual abilities serious enough to interfere with daily life. 

Research Is Essential

Dementia due to Alzheimer’s and related conditions is a major emerging public health problem.  According to a New York Times article “The Age of Alzheimer’s” by Sandra Day O’Connor, Stanley Prusiner and Ken Dychtwald,

“It is estimated that 13.5 million Americans will be stricken with Alzheimer’s by 2050 – up from 5 million today.

“Experience has taught us that we cannot avoid Alzheimer’s disease by having regular medical checkups, by being involved in nourishing relationships or by going to the gym or filling in crossword puzzles.  What is needed are new medicines that attack the causes of the disease directly.”

“As things stand today, for each penny the National Institute of Health spends on Alzheimer’s research, we spend more than $3.50 on caring for people with the condition.  This explains why the financial cost of not conducting adequate research is so high.”

While for the most part dementia cannot be cured, its chronic nature has necessitated the development of approaches to managing its symptoms, supporting caregivers, and improving life quality.  Significant progress is being made on three important fronts:  scientific discovery to find a cure, patient-family centered care, and the world-class education of health care professions and lay people alike.

Scientific Discovery

Research at Johns Hopkins Medicine is focused on discovering biomarkers – biological indicators (i.e. blood, spinal fluid, brain images, etc.) for Alzheimer’s and related conditions.   These have the potential for detecting disease at the very earliest stages – even before symptoms develop.  This approach is critical because Alzheimer’s begins in the brain many years, if not decades, before symptoms occur.  These are being coupled with the testing of novel and understudied potential treatments for Alzheimer’s disease in part using the biomarkers as they are discovered.

Patient-Family Centered Care

State of the art dementia care involves a “package” of interventions including the use of FDA approved medications, specific management for symptoms, careful management of other medical conditions or illnesses, aggressive rehabilitation, daily structure and activities, as well as systematic support and skills training for all caregivers.   The Johns Hopkins Dementia Care Model has been shown to improve outcomes by reducing symptoms, improving life quality, reducing caregiver burden, and is also being assessed as a means of delaying time to institutionalization in home based individuals with dementia.  It has been adopted in a variety of ways (e.g., American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry) and is well articulated in the now classic manual:  Practical Dementia Care (Rabins, Lyketsos and Steele 2006).

Education

The education of physicians in the highly specialized needs of Alzheimer’s patients is central to our mission.    At the Johns Hopkins Memory and Alzheimer’s Treatment Center we provide a first of its kind two year multi-disciplinary fellowship that co-trains one fellow in geriatric medicine, psychiatry and neurology.  This multi-disciplinary fellowship emphasizes diagnosis and management of dementia in addition to broad training in the respective specialties.

 Constantine G. Lyketsos, M.D., MHS

The Johns Hopkins Memory and Alzheimer’s Treatment Center (MATC) is focused on providing the best care of patients with memory disorders, advancing scientific discover into its causes and treatment, and teaching professionals and caregivers how to effectively help patients suffering from these conditions.  Our motto, therefore, is “where care meets cure.”