Long ago I pledged to use this blog as a forum to advocate for Alzheimer’s disease research. Why? Because it affects me directly along with members of my family who have suffered the agony of watching loved ones get sick and die from this merciless killer.

I lost my mother to it. Her younger brother died of complications from Alzheimer’s disease just a couple of years ago. My aunt has just been diagnosed with the disease. One of my dearest friends — a with whom I go back more than 60 years — is now watching his mother wither away from the disease.

You see, Alzheimer’s disease afflicts not just its victims. The collateral damage it inflicts goes far beyond the number of actual “victims” of the disease.

Last I heard, about 4 million Americans have been diagnosed with the disease. Multiply that figure by many times … two, three, four or five, whatever.

Then you come up with a number more closely representing the total casualty count delivered by Alzheimer’s.

Loved ones suffer the most | High Plains Blogger

Thus, as the nation ages — as it is doing — you see the numbers of Alzheimer’s patients increasing. Just as critically, we will witness the number of affected loved ones increase even more dramatically.

The Alzheimer’s patient loses his or her cognitive ability over time. It’s the loved one who cares for his or her spouse, the parent, the sibling or even the extended member of the family who needs help. Is the government ever going to be prepared to offer them counseling, or advice, or wisdom?

Yes, this disease harms so many Americans in so many ways and at so many levels.

We need to stay busy looking for a cure.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com

Some disease inflicts maximum pain on its direct victims. You know what they are.

Others inflict its maximum damage on those who care for those victims. Yes, I refer to Alzheimer’s disease.

I just got word the other day that a beloved member of my family has been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. We haven’t seen her in a couple of years; she and her husband and children and grandchildren live in the Pacific Northwest, about 1,600 miles from us in North Texas.

We don’t know many of the particulars of my aunt’s condition, other than her husband of more than 60 years is in dire emotional straits.

My immediate family and I know all too well the pain that this disease inflicts on those who love its victims. My mother died of complications from it in 1984. She was 61 years old when she died. She likely had early-onset symptoms perhaps a decade or so. We were young and not too alert to the disease. Then a neurologist gave us the diagnosis in early 1980, telling us the grim news all at once: There is no cure and there is no hope for survival.

Why bring all this up? Because millions more Americans suffer the agony than the number of victims of this hideous, insidious and merciless killer. It is always fatal. Modern medicine has no cure for Alzheimer’s disease, although therapies keep emerging that prolong the quality of life of those afflicted with the disease.

As the nation continues to grow older, the cases of this form of dementia are bound to increase. And yes … I want to put additional pressure on our scientific community to step its efforts to seek a cure to end the epidemic of misery that is going to envelop this nation over time.

I am left to pray that my aunt, my uncle their three children can latch onto an improved therapy to help her cope with her loss of cognition.

It also can help them await an inevitable outcome with some measure of comfort. They suffer grievous emotional pain watching the essence of their loved one disappear in real time.

johnkanelis_92@hotmail.com