Final project for coursera course "The Neurobiology of Everyday Life - by University of Chicago" focusing on impact of Alzheimer's disease to the brain.

1. Don’t ask me to
remember
Alzheimer's effects to the brain
A.Anagnostopoulou
January 2020

2. Don’t ask me to remember…
• My grandmother, Maria, presented the first signs of Alzheimer’s at the age of 70, shortly after my
grandfather passed away. She lived with the disease for 17 years losing her precious memories and her
motor functions as time went by.
• I decided to analyze the effects Alzheimer's had on her, specifically to her memory & language
functions , as she was very dear to my heart and it was a painful journey not only for her but also for
our family.
• At the beginning, my grandmother started simply being forgetful; misplacing things, going to the
supermarket multiple times to buy the same item or losing personal items. This made her frustrated,
sad and sometimes aggressive when we called out her forgetfulness. When we asked her “Do you
remember the time we were in Rhodes?”, she often got emotional & said “Please don’t ask me to
remember…” She once admitted in tears ‘Something is happening to me I know it; I just can’t
understand what it is….’
• As time went by, she started forgetting more and more, not recognizing her grandchildren anymore
(‘who is this girl here?’) and starting to call my father with her father’s name instead as more recent
memories started to disappear.
• After 8 years her basic functions e.g. speech & language comprehension started to deteriorate and later
she was unable to control her urinal function, her walking & eating (due to apraxia*). As a result she
spent the last years of her life in bed, taken care by our family & a full time caregiver.
*Source: Harvard Health – HelpGuide

3. Alzheimer's & the nervous system’s affected
areas (memory & language)
• During Alzheimer’s the cortex is degenerated and the temporal lobe is slowly ‘lost’. The temporal lobes
are responsible for sensory processing, auditory perception, language and speech
production, and memory storage*.
• The key area affected by Alzheimer’s is the Hippocampus which becomes smaller over time (see
image in next slide), leading to memory loss especially of episodic memories.
• Recent events & memories were lost first as hippocampus is critical for episodic memory recall, while
she could no longer make new explicit memories.
• My grandmother did keep some recent episodic memories for a few years (e.g. when she once forgot
to pick me up from school as a kid, as she was carried away by cleaning the house recalling all the
details & my name correctly, yet not realizing she was telling the story to the same person just 5-6
years later). The memory stayed with her for a few years as she was often telling the story when
health, which means the memory was well consolidated in her neocortex.
• Her inability to recognize me when I was older was due to visuospatial dysfunction, impacting her
visual perception & comprehension.
• As the disease progressed, she started losing her language skills, presenting expressive aphasia first
and comprehensive aphasia next, which I know understand means that her left hemisphere was
damaged and her Wernicke’s & Brocka’s areas had started to degenerate.
*Source: Understanding the Brain: The Neurobiology of Everyday Life - University of Chicago

4. Alzheimer’s impact on the brain (physiology)
Sources: 1) Harvard Health – HelpGuide, 2) TedXOrangeCoast
Image 1 Image 2

5. What was still working in the beginning
• Whilst Alzheimer’s impacts degenerates the brain increasingly as time
goes by, there are some areas that are still functioning for some time and
start to degenerate only later in time, while others e.g. cerebellum are
not directly or affected in different/milder ways*.
• In my grandmother’s case for example, her motor skills (walking ,
balance, moving arms) were intact in the first 6-7 years of her disease
and she was able to move around the house or go for a walk with us, as
the disease seems to first impact the temporal lobe which is mainly
affecting memory.
• As the disease progresses, the frontal & parietal lobes * are also starting
to be impacted which results into language skill impairment (aphasia),
spacial perception and behavioral and mood problems.
*Sources: 1) Understanding the Brain: The Neurobiology of Everyday Life - University of Chicago, 2) Quartz – K.Foley

6. How the ‘Neurobiology of everyday life’
course helped me
• This course helped me better understand my grandmother’s behaviors
during the disease as well as the disease’s progression during those 17 years.
• Thanks to the detailed explanation of the different brain areas & their
related functions I was able to recognize which areas where impaired in my
grandmother’s case (e.g. temporal lobe, hippocampus) and what the impact
of this impairment was on her.
• Additionally, the course allowed me to recognize what was not affected until
very late in her life but also understand the grave impact of this disease on
the brain.
• Lastly, I now fully comprehend her frustration and anxiety as well as the
moments of aggression which made me sad as I was younger; now
recognizing it was her brain that was “talking” rather than her emotions
towards her family.

7. Thank you!