Hi there,
I am new to the forum and briefly wanted to introduce myself. My name is Britta and I am 48 years old and live in Los Angeles. I heard about Dr. Bredesen when he introduced his book at our local bookstore in Manhattan Beach.
My father was diagnosed with Alzheimers about 10 years ago. He lives in Duesseldorf, Germany. He has been living on his own for many years until 4 weeks ago. Christmas Day 2019 he came to a family Christmas celebration and had a terrible bruise/rash on his eye and forehead. He said a branch fell from a tree and hit him in the face. After two more days the infection got really bad and my mom took him to the hospital. [b]Long story short, he was diagnosed with Shingles (Herpes Zoster opthalmicus) and he was treated in the hospital for 2 1/2 weeks (Universitaetsklinik Duesseldorf).[/b] He was very disorientated while in the hospital and my mom had to stay with him. My parents are divorced but get along really well and still spend a lot of time together. Now that he is back home he doesn't recognize my mom anymore, he is lost in his own house, doesn't know his street address and can't remember his occupation of 45 years.
I am aware that these are all common signs with Alzheimer's disease but I have to point out that my dad was living on his own until 4 weeks ago. He did his grocery shopping, cooking, gardening by himself. He was using his iPhone and taking the tram independently. Even though my parents are divorced, my mom was nice enough to take him to the hospital and check in with him for the two weeks. Now she ended up living with him at his house because he is really lost.
Does anybody know if Herpes Zoster ophthalmicus (or Shingles on and above the eye) affects the brain of Alzheimer's patients in a different way than normally? His situation got so bad over the short time of 2 weeks, that I have the feeling there must be a relation between the two diseases. If anybody has experienced this before, I would appreciate some input or info on this. And .... is there anything we can do to help him?
Fyi - My mother took him to a functional medicine doctor (with the suggested list of tests in Dr. Bredesen's book). So within the next 2 weeks we will hopefully know more about possible deficiencies he might have.
I went through the primer and stavia's explanations and hope this was the correct place to post this. If not, please let me know and I can remove it and possibly post it at a different location.
Thank you so much,
Britta