Home / Critical illness cover / - Alzheimer's Disease
Background information
There are now over 700,000 people with Dementia.
By the year 2010, if the current rate of growth continues, this figure will rise to 850,000.
(Alzheimer's Society, 2002)
Definition
Alzheimer’s disease having progressed to the extent that continual supervision and the assistance of another person is required. The diagnosis must be supported by evidence of progressive loss of ability to:
- remember;
- reason; and
- perceive, understand, express and give effect to ideas.
The condition must be irreversible with no reasonable prospect of there ever being any improvement.
What does this mean?
Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive and degenerative disease. The nerve cells in the brain deteriorate and the brain shrinks. The symptoms can include a severe loss of memory and concentration but there is an overall decline in all mental faculties.
06 August 2008 17:27:22
An antibiotic developed from maggots may be used to fend off different types of bacteria including certain types of the deadly methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA), Fox news reported.
Students from Swansea undertook the study and they believe that maggots may now be used to fight superbug infections in hospitals.
Those with life insurance policies maybe interested to know that the team developed a drug called Seraticin that is made from secretions of green bottle fly larvae.
They now believe that they may be able to tackle up to 12 strains of the superbug and that it could be effective against E.coli and C.diff.
Live maggots have recently been used on patient's wounds to help fight MRSA by eating dead tissue, the Mirror reported.
UK life insurance policyholders have learnt that new research from the US has found that patients who are carrying MRSA for long periods of time are at an increased risk of infection and death.
06 August 2008 17:22:31
Those without life insurance policies will be pleased to hear about a proposed program that involves vaccinating children against flu in order to provide protection for the rest of the population.
Whilst the Daily Mail claimed that running the programme could cut flu infection rates by 70 per cent, the Daily Telegraph reported that "flu could be virtually wiped out if all under 16s were vaccinated against the disease".
A similar programe was considered and subsequently rejected in 2006 by the Joint Committee on Vaccinations and Immunisation, the NHS reported.
New research published in the Lancet this week suggested that the influenza vaccine did not provide as much protection as was previously thought.
In the study a group of 3,500 individuals were tested and it was uncovered that in those over 65 there was no link between the flu vaccination and the risk of those people contracting pneumonia.
UK life insurance provides cover in case of injury or illness.
05 August 2008 17:34:54
Those with and without life insurance policies may be interested to know that a trial of a vaccine for HIV patients which allows them to take breaks from their regular medication is planned, the BBC reported.
The trial, which was announced at the Aids 2008 conference in Mexico City, will involve 345 patients in both the US and Europe and the results are due by the end of 2009.
It is hoped that the vaccine could help alleviate side effects associated with the drugs currently used to treat the virus and may help delay the emergence of strains of HIV that are resistant to the drugs.
Dr Barry Peters, of Kings College London, who is leading the research in the UK, said: "A successful immunotherapeutic HIV vaccine would give patients and doctors enormous advantages over current treatments, both in developed and developing countries."
Whilst Dr Peters has qualified that the vaccine being trialled is not the "complete answer", it could go some way to helping produce a "full" vaccine.
UK life insurance provides policy holders with cover in case of illness or injury.
