This question comes from watching the TV right now, and they’re talking about Bruce Willis. I feel bad for him, I really do…
Bruce Willis apparently has what they call Frontotemporal Dementia. That’s a tounge twister mouthful for most average people, I can only assume Mr. Willis probably can’t even remember the name of his own condition…
Why isn’t there a ‘patient-friendly’ easy to remember name for disorders that literally affect a person’s brain and memory?
Like shit, I bet most people wouldn’t know what polytetrafluoroethylene is, but they gave everyone a simple name to know it by, teflon.
So, why don’t they have simpler terms for brain disorders so the suffering patient might be able to talk to their own doctor privately…?
Is “senile” not simple enough for you? The problem is, it’s maligned because its too loosely applied and becomes used as an insult. So it’s really a no-win scenario. Make it too simple and it becomes clinically useless and people will throw it around like an insult, make it too complex and it becomes only useful in clinical settings and average people can’t remember it. Is there a middle ground? I’m not sure. Alzheimer’s and dementia/demented are kind of in the middle, but they both get used inappropriately and are clinically useless, so they end up being a worst of both worlds.
You do make a bit of a point there, it really does seem like a ‘no-win’ scenario…
Sigh, just brainstorming a thought towards trying to assist disabled people a little better. 🤷
Nothing wrong with asking the question and I’m sorry if my response sounded dismissive or hostile, I actually think you asked a great question and your heart is definitely in the right place. I think we should do a lot more discussion and education around brain diseases and brain aging, if we spent as much time trying to understand how natural intelligence works as we do how artificial intelligence works these days, maybe we’d have a lot less chaos in the world.