For many years, the ability to fight back against illnesses like dementia has been limited; in truth, the majority of people were just sent to a dementia clinic to be helped settle as best as they possibly could. However, there has finally been a groundbreaking discovery within the fight to find a cure for things like dementia and Alzheimer's disease, as well as Parkinson's disease and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, or ALS.
It's been found that when nerves are affected by traumatic injury or some kind of disease, they start to die off. This gives scientists and researchers hope that they can find something that will help to combat these conditions, and perhaps even be the catalyst to halting them altogether.
The key connection here is that our nerves are capable of connecting through one another via something knowing as axons. This allows us to process things like memory and recollection, and when axons start to die off they can be the cause behind a loss of memory and other similar problems.
Researchers have shown in recent studies that they know how to make this problem stop, and they understand how to avoid axons from dying off. By stopping the death of these axons, there is a chance that these illnesses could finally be stopped or fought against.
If replicated via medication, this could stop people from having to go through the stress and pain of both axons dying, and indeed the stress and limitations that are imposed by a neurological illness. Whilst much still has to be researched and proven about this breakthrough, it plays a key role in helping find some form of long-standing cure or aid for these debilitating and painful conditions.
Axons degeneration is a key symptom of many of the main neurological illnesses, and stopping this vital process will ensure that communication between parts of the body can retain its strength.
This should help with things like recalling memories and even help fight off a loss of awareness along the way. It's also seen as a key initiator of the symptoms that develop being able to actually start and then progress - without the communication that was there previously, it's easy to see how functionality could become limited.
There has been another interesting breakthrough from this, though, and that is that axons are known to actually begin their own demise if are unhealthy and already weakened. Studies are underway to find out the importance of these pathways and how they can be used to battle back against things like dementia.
This pathway is now understood clearer than ever, and gives the scientific minds involved a good chance to get involved and see if they can find out more about the potential causes of axon degeneration in general.