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Dementia is when someone loses brain function a little at a time. Damage to the brain from dementia is permanent and often gets worse over time. It affects thinking, decision-making, memory, emotion, and many other things controlled by the brain.
With vascular dementia or vascular cognitive impairment, this happens because the brain is not getting enough blood. The blood vessels in the brain are too blocked or damaged to carry enough blood and oxygen to the brain. Without enough oxygen, brain cells die.
This is what happens when someone has a stroke. With a major stroke, the loss of brain function is often noticeable right away. But a person can have smaller, “silent” strokes that don’t seem to cause problems at first. With these strokes, the damage adds up over time and the person gradually loses brain function.
Vascular is the second most-common type of dementia. Only Alzheimer’s disease is more common.
People with vascular dementia will have the same symptoms as people with other types of dementia. Early symptoms include:
As time goes on, a person with vascular dementia could also have these symptoms:
People with vascular dementia may also have some of the typical neurological (nerve) symptoms from a stroke:
Call 911 immediately if there are signs of a stroke, including:
See a doctor as soon as you notice any of the early stage symptoms of dementia. You may also want to the see doctor if you are older than 65 years old and have risk factors for vascular dementia. These risk factors include high blood pressure, heart disease, and past stroke or mini-stroke (also called a transient ischemic attack, or TIA).
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To diagnose vascular dementia, the doctor may do several things, including:
There is no treatment to fix parts of the brain that have been damaged by stroke.
You may be able to prevent further damage by doing the things that prevent heart disease and stroke. It is important to take the medicines your doctor tells you to take to control blood pressure, prevent blood clots, and control cholesterol.
In the early stages of vascular dementia, you may be able to take medicines that have been used to slow the progress of other types of dementia, like Alzheimer’s disease.
You can prevent vascular dementia throughout your life by preventing diseases of your heart and blood vessels. Take these prevention steps:
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