Causes and Symptoms of Mild Cognitive Impairment

How Can It Be Managed and Prevented?

Korea is expected to become a super-aged society soon. As the elderly population in Korea continues to grow, various degenerative diseases are also increasing.

In particular, interest in dementia, a representative disease of old age, has been rising. To reduce the risk of developing dementia, it is important to begin managing it during the stage of mild cognitive impairment.

Today, let’s take a look at what mild cognitive impairment, the stage before dementia, means, along with its symptoms and how to manage and prevent them.

As the pace of population aging accelerates, the number of patients receiving treatment for dementia, a representative degenerative brain disease, is also rapidly increasing.

In the early stages of dementia, symptoms such as decreased memory appear, and as the symptoms gradually worsen, problems such as reduced thinking ability, comprehension, and calculation ability occur.

In the case of dementia, once symptoms worsen, it becomes difficult to maintain daily life, so early treatment is necessary. Dementia also has a pre-stage that acts as a middle stop before onset.

That stage is mild cognitive impairment, which refers to a condition in which cognitive functions such as memory and language ability are lower than those of people in the same age group.

When cognitive decline reaches the point where help is needed in daily life, it is diagnosed as dementia, so this symptom can be seen as the pre-stage of dementia.

The causes of this symptom are known to be influenced by late-life depression, alcohol, drug misuse, and chronic illnesses.

This condition is somewhere between forgetfulness and dementia, where most thinking abilities are normal, but memory is impaired.

Compared with dementia, most abilities such as perception, reasoning, and judgment are normal, but compared with simple forgetfulness, instances of forgetting due to lapses occur frequently.

Therefore, if this symptom is suspected, it is important to determine whether it is forgetfulness that could lead to dementia or simply forgetfulness due to aging.

If you forget appointments themselves, have other cognitive function problems along with memory loss, and experience inconvenience in daily life due to decreased memory, this symptom may be suspected.

If these symptoms appear in yourself, it is important to manage them early through testing, and you should identify the cause and carry out appropriate treatment and preventive activities accordingly.

First, it is good to keep the brain active. Activities such as reading, writing a journal, and hobbies can help with symptom management.

In addition, to help prevent symptoms, if you have cerebrovascular risk factors such as diabetes or high blood pressure, it is important to manage them well.

Also, doing regular exercise that does not place too much strain on the body can be helpful, and maintaining a healthy diet along with stress management helps prevent symptoms.

Today, we looked at what mild cognitive impairment is, along with its symptoms and how to manage and prevent them. Please refer to the information above.