Zuzana Gdovinová
Alzheimer´s disease (AD) is progressive neurodegenerative disease characterised by memory impairment and loss of cognitive functions. Prevalency of AD in US is about 2,3 millions, and is increased with age, women are affected more often. The most successful therapeutic approach has been based on the cholinergic hypothesis of AD. This hypothesis suggests that loss of cholinergic neurons in septal and basalis nuclei results in deficient cholinergic transmission, whith resulting memory, learning and cognitive losses. The most succesfful pharmacologic approach has been to inhibit cholinesterase enzyms. For this inhibition are used donepezil (Aricept), rivastigmin (Exelon) and galantamin (Reminyl), and in the last time noncompetitive antagonist of NMDA receptors - memantine (Ebixa). The most important for successful treatment is start in mild dementia.