Awareness about Alzheimer’s
KUWAIT: The Women’s Cultural and Social Society held a one-day event at The Avenues yesterday to raise awareness about Alzheimer’s. Members of the society distributed awareness brochures and booklets. An illustrative screen displayed detailed information, while two doctors were available, one in the morning and the other in the evening, to answer questions related to Alzheimer’s. Specialists from the old-age home were also present.
“We have a health committee for health projects such as Al Amal Club that deals with cancer, Al Asdiqa Club caring for psychiatric diseases and Al Bustan nursery for children with hearing difficulties. The society also holds awareness courses and conferences, and these include for Alzheimer’s,” Moudhi Sqeer, a member of the society, told Kuwait Times yesterday. “Alzheimer’s is spreading, especially since people now live longer and we have more elderly people. Alzheimer’s usually affects people above 65 years of age, but rarely it can even affect a 50-year-old, and the risk increases at 85,” she added.
There are no exact statistics in Kuwait as well as in most Middle East countries about this disease. “We are cooperating with the old-age home that provides us with unofficial statistics. According to them, there are about 60,000 elderly Kuwaitis, and about 5 percent of them (3,000) are or may be suffering from Alzheimer’s. This figure is an approximate one as in our conservative community, people keep this secret and feel ashamed about others knowing this,” explained Sqeer.
The event was mainly for families or caregivers of patients with Alzheimer’s. “As the patient is usually isolated from the society, and those taking care of him - whether family members or medical staff - suffer from depression or psychological problems, we try to help them by providing awareness through books and brochures that we publish or through the courses we hold,” she noted. “We give them information, such as for instance if a patient is afraid of loud noises, they should not talk to him from the back but should approach from the front. If he is scared of darkness in the afternoon, they should take care of that. We teach them ways of dealing and taking care of the patient,” she added.
“This is the first time such an event was held at a mall, as we want to tell the community about our work and what we do. We want them to communicate with us. We also let the visitors to register their contact information so we can inform them when we have an event to make them benefit from it,” concluded Sqeer.