National Alzheimer's disease program

The psycho-behavioral troubles of patients with an Alzheimer's Disease (AD) are such that it is very difficult to keep those patients within the normal family environment, and that it therefore proves necessary to have them placed in a specially adapted residence manned by a highly specialised medical and para-medical staff. Within the frame of such an approach, a new type of residence has been devised "Asclepios Gardens", a one-level ranch-type residence, including 44 individual apartments, each opening, on the one hand, on a little private garden opening itself on a large, strictly enclosed and protected, 5-acre park, and, on the other hand, on a collective living structure conceived for social activities under attentive medical care, to help the patients restore their social structures. In a such residences, besides the special training given to the staff (medical, para-medical), aimed at developing as much as possible the patients' autonomy and self-reliance in every aspect of everyday life, you find a psychometric computerized "activation" program, devised both on a collective basis with differentiated subprograms, for groups of patients that have been classified according to the degree of seriousness of their problem, and-whenever possible, with individual attention programs; the whole of this "activation" method has thus clearly a double target; first to develop what is left of the patients' autonomy, for instance by psychometric exercises, and moreover, to have them start new activities, which they had never practised before--this latter action with a view to developing their neuroplasticity resources. And finally, a new chemical therapy is proposed. This substance induced a significant improvement in 40% of cases and a slight improvement in 20%. These results were observed through a series of specific psychometric tests (Visuo Retention Test of Benton, Mnesic profile of Rey), a global scale (Mini Mental State), and a general evaluation of the patients' daily activities by the General Practitioner and by the family. These preliminary data very interesting yet must be confirmed in a larger Alzheimer population.