About Alzheimer's Disease

Alzheimer's is a disease of the brain that causes a steady decline in memory. This results in dementia - loss of intellectual functions (thinking, remembering and reasoning) severe enough to interfere with everyday life.

When German physician Alois Alzheimer first described the disease in 1907, it was considered rare. Today, Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia, affecting 10 percent of people 65 years old, and nearly 50 percent of those age 85 or older. An estimated 4 million Americans have Alzheimer's.