“I don’t want to brag,” Mom told us
after she was assessed at the University of California, Davis, “but I think I
got an A.”
Here’s what we got. A letter from John Olichney, M.D.
Neurologist. For some reason, it was
addressed to me with a cc to Kathy Loss, who was her companion for 40+ years. (I’m going to type up a portion every day
until I get in (but not into) my students’ grades.
March
14, 2011
Dear
Ms. Martin:
This
letter is intended to provide you with a summary of my recent evaluation of her
mother, Nadine Martin. We think it will
be most clear if we first review the medical diagnostic evaluation, and then
discuss our recommendations.
As
we explained in the conference, our diagnosis is Alzheimer’s disease. Although there is no single diagnostic test
that indicates the presence of the disease, when a comprehensive and
appropriate diagnostic workup is done there is a high degree of accuracy. Factors we considered include: the history of the illness, the neurological
and neuropsychological examinations, evaluation of laboratory tests and review
of the brain scan.
All
of the evidence we reviewed is consistent with Alzheimer’s disease and most
importantly did not show evidence of a treatable condition that could cause the
problems your mother is experiencing.
While
the stages of dementia may be described in different ways, we generally separate
the disease into three stages: Early,
middle and late. The severity of the dementia
describes the degree of cognitive impairments as mild, moderate or severe. Our findings suggest your mother is the
middle stage with moderate impairments.
As
I explained at the appointment, you should follow-up with Ms. Rhoades in the
near future regarding evaluation results and medication recommendations. With your permission we are sending a summary
of this evaluation to Steven Johnson, MD.
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