2013_06_27_CIE_jornadas-monograficas

About 350 people attended the II conference monographs of the University of Navarra and the City Council of Fitero, in which medical specialists and associations have presented the latest advances in neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's or Alzheimer's disease. The latter was dealt with by the neurologist of the Clínica Universidad de NavarraMario Riverol, in the last session held on June 21.

According to this expert, there are 500,000 people with Alzheimer's disease in Spain and it is expected that, with the progressive aging of the population in Western countries, the number of patients with this disease will grow exponentially to affect 13 million people in Western Europe by 2050. "Alzheimer's disease is the most frequent neurodegenerative disease, ahead of Parkinson's or amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. It affects 5-10% of the population over the age of 65 and increases with age to 40% of those over 85," he noted.

Symptoms and treatment
Riverol emphasized that the disease manifests itself fundamentally "with a progressive disorder of the patients' recent report , which can affect development activities of daily living. Currently, there is no curative treatment, but research is being done on tools that allow a more precise and early diagnosis in order to be able to treat, even before the patient's status is very advanced," he said.

At the closing of the conference , the University of Navarra was represented by the Vice President of research, Iciar Astiasarán, Professor María José Calasanz and researcher Diego Rupérez; the mayor of Fitero, Francisco Javier Yanguas; and the Navarre Health Service, director-General Manager Ángel Sanz Barea.