Alzheimer's Disease and Communication Difficulties
Essential communication skills such as speech, reading and
writing begin to be lost in one of the most upsetting and
frustrating aspects of the disease.
While an understanding of simple speech remains intact during
the early stages, the patient can experience growing
difficulties in finding and using the correct words.
However as the effects of the disease intensify the patient will
have difficultly finishing sentences and will wander onto
another subject and may often repeat the same words over and
over again.
The ability to find the words needed to complete a sentence or
become involved in a conversation also decreases, in other words
(paraphrase), are added into the gaps left, the true meaning of
the conversation can be lost.
They will also experience increasing difficulty in interpreting
complex conversations, proverbs and metaphors and lose the
ability to use or understand complex sentences.
This may mean that questions are left answered because they are
not understood and keeping a sentence going often proves too
difficult for the sufferer.
Eventually their whole speech often becomes babbling gibberish,
and gradually the Alzheimer sufferer withdraws from talking
altogether.
Reading and writing may become affected quite early in the
disease, with spelling difficulties becoming apparent.
There is also a poor attention span and associated lack of
interest in the task which is often left uncompleted.
The taking of phone messages can prove particularly difficult
and can often be the key that reveals the first signs of the
dementia.
The sufferer will have difficulty following the conversation and
become confused and frightened, making their problem worse.
Communication eventually becomes impossible in advanced stages
of the disease as the sufferer is usually unable to communicate
even their basic needs to others.
While some patients exhibit some automatic verbal response on
occasions, the burden of communication falls more and more on
the shoulders of relatives, friends and care givers.