This is the story of the night my ten-year-old cat, Rudy, got his head stuck in the garbage disposal. I knew at the time that the experience would be funny if the cat survived, so let me tell you right up front that he’s fine.

 Getting him out wasn’t easy, though, and the process included numerous home remedies, a plumber, two cops, an emergency overnight veterinary clinic, a case of mistaken identity, five hours of panic, and fifteen minutes of fame.

 First, some background.

 My husband, Rich, and I had just returned from a five-day spring-break vacation in the Cayman Islands, where I had been sick as a dog the whole time, trying to convince myself that if I had to feel lousy, it was better to do it in paradise.

 We had arrived home at 9 pm, a day and a half later than we had planned because of airline problems. I still had illness-related vertigo, and because of the flight delays, had not been able to prepare the class I was supposed to teach at 8:40 the next morning. I sat down at my desk to think about William Carlos Williams, and around ten o’clock I heard Rich hollering something undecipherable from the kitchen.

 As I raced out to see what was wrong, I saw Rich frantically rooting around under the kitchen sink and Rudy, or rather, Rudy’s headless body scrambling around in the sink, his

claws clicking in panic on the metal. Rich had just ground up the skin of some smoked salmon in the garbage disposal, and when he left the room, Rudy (whom we always did call a pinhead) had gone in after it.

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The symptoms of this form of dementia are often mild at the outset and can be extremely variable from day to day.  Common symptoms include :

Ø     Fluctuation in the condition

Ø     Visual hallucinations

Ø     Extreme sensitivity to classical anti-psychotic medications leading to marked symptoms of stiffness, tremor and restriction of movement

Dementia with Lewy bodies sometimes occurs with Alzheimer’s disease and Vascular dementia.

Disturbances of personality, behavior and language may come before, and initially be more severe than, memory defects.

Huntington’s Disease affects approximately 7 in every 100,000 people in the western world.  The disease usually appears between 30 and 50 years of age.

Huntington’s Disease is characterized by intellectual decline and irregular, involuntary movement of the limbs or facial muscles.  Other symptoms include:

Ø     Personality change

Ø     Memory disturbance

Ø     Slurred speech

Ø     Impaired judgment

Ø     Psychiatric problems

There is no treatment available to stop the progression of this disease, but medication can control movement disorders and psychiatric symptoms.

Dementia occurs in the majority of Huntington’s Disease cases.

If people don’t drink, or they drink at a safe level, then they cannot develop Alcohol Related Dementia.  The most vulnerable parts of the brain are those used for memory, and for planning, organizing and judgment, social skills and balance.  If drinking stops there may be some improvement. Taking thiamine appears to help prevent and improve the condition.

An extremely rare and fatal brain disorder caused by a prion, which is a protein particle.  The disease occurs in one in every million people per year.

The early symptoms of this disease include:

Ø     Failing memory

Ø     Changes in behavior

Ø     Lack of coordination

After which, the disease progresses rapidly, resulting in :

Ø     Pronounced mental deterioration

Ø     Involuntary movements appear

Ø     Person may become blind

Ø     Develop weakness in the arms or legs and finally lapse into a coma

This disease can jump species barriers, and can affect cows, humans, and other animals.

The Australian Red Cross (and other Red Cross organizations around the world) expressly forbid anyone who lived in the United Kingdom between the years of 1980 and 1998 to donate blood, because of the higher than average possibility that they consumed beef from slaughtered Mad Cows that entered the human food chain in the UK (in spite of promises and guarantees from numerous UK politicians).  It is feared that these people will go on to develop Mad Cow Disease later in life, and if they were allowed to donate blood, that the recipients of this blood could also develop the disease.

Researchers have found that between 6 and 25 percent of people with MCI progress on to Alzheimer’s, which has raised questions about whether MCI might represent some kind of "transitional stage" between normal aging and dementia.

Many experts currently believe that MCI, as well as age-related memory loss, may be an early form of Alzheimer’s, and progression to symptomatic Alzheimer’s disease may be only a matter of time.

However, in some people, the progression may be very slow, so the person may die of other causes before displaying the full spectrum of Alzheimer’s symptoms.

MCI is recognized as a clinical condition that requires ongoing assessment and possibly treatment to delay its progression.

Research into MCI is continuing.

Thanks for reading. We’ll be back with more in a couple of days.

Shanti