Episode Transcript
LESLIE-ANN SEON: On this episode of Seon180, I will be chatting with Dr. Kester Nedd, a board-certified neurologist based in Miami, an influential, inspirational voice in the field of neurological conditions, disorders, and disease. We're moving beyond the borders.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Be bold. Take risks. Lead by example. Believe in your power. Say what you feel mean, what you say. Hi, I'm Leslie Seon, host of the new podcast series, Seon180. Join me at Seon180 on this journey of discovery and advancement.
ADVERTISEMENT: Searching for that ideal house or rental property with a picture-perfect view of the ocean, or lush green hills and breeze that gently caresses your face. Century 21, Grenada helps our clients to go beyond the search to living at Century 21. Our agents understand that a home isn't just walls and a roof, but a sacred, inspiring place where you learn, laugh, play, and create. Contact us today at C21 grenada.com or give us a call at (473) 440-5227. Go Beyond with Century 21.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Hello again, and welcome to Seon 180. I'm your host, Leslie-Ann Seon. On our podcast series, we feature Caribbean voices from around the world who are making real differences in their areas of influence. I invite you to check out my website at Seon180.com, or visit any of your favorite podcast streaming sites for current episodes as well as past shows. You can also visit my Facebook or Instagram page for weekly updates, tidbits, advice, and interactions with me, your host, and fellow listeners.
Today's topic, channeling Alzheimer's and dementia for you, me, and the family. Today we are chatting with Dr. Kester Nedd, a Grenadian by birth, living and working in Miami as a board-certified neurologist. His sub specialty training is in neurological rehabilitation and neurotrauma, but today we zero in on his expertise, focusing on Alzheimer's and dementia, unravelling, this degenerative disease that seems to plague so very many Caribbean homes. Dr. Nedd is a director of the Design Neuroscience Center, which offers a comprehensive approach to the evaluation, treatment, and rehabilitation of patients with various neurological conditions. Dr. Nedd, thanks so much for joining us today.
DR. NEDD: Thank you.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: And I hope you had a good Thanksgiving weekend.
DR NED: Sure did.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Excellent. Uh, Doc, as you know, this very heart-breaking topic of Alzheimer's and dementia, um, is quite prevalent in the Caribbean, and there are many, uh, misconceptions, misunderstandings, uh, about this disease, um, which is ravaging families and homes alike. And so today, I wanted us, in the very short 30 minutes that we have, uh, to speak a little bit about the clinical side of this disease from your expertise. And I wanted to understand both for myself and the audience, uh, how do you define Alzheimer's and dementia, and can you explain the difference?
DR NEDD: Sure. So good morning to everyone, and, um, Alzheimer's is just one form of dementia. There are many other types of dementia, and dementia is generally a term that's used to describe a brain disorder that affects your memory, your thinking, your behavior, and how you manage your emotions—and most dementia is associated with the aging process. Now, there are some dementias that occur even before aging, before you are, uh, considered elder. But let's, let's sort of break it down in terms of where Alzheimer's fit. It's the most common form of dementia.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes.
DR NEDD: And most dementias are diagnosed by a doctor. Uh, when you meet the clinical signs and symptoms, there are some diagnostic tools that we could use. But at the end of the day, especially Alzheimer's is a diagnosis made by a clinician. Uh, it's confirmed in most of the cases we confirm. We know for sure you have Alzheimer's at the time of autopsy when someone literally examines your brain, but there are tools that we use as neuroscientists to be able to come up with the diagnosis.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes.
DR NEDD: So again, there are various forms of dementia. You have what's called vascular dementia. That's the one that's caused by people not taking their blood pressure medications or controlling their diabetes.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Right.
DR NEDD: And what happens, the small vessels in the brain actually deteriorate and you lose, you lose, uh, nerve cells. In this case, uh, this type of dementia is not as rapidly progressive as Alzheimer's. There are other forms, like Lewy body dementia,
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Lewy body. Yes…
DR NEDD: Exactly. Frontal, temporal dementia. Yes. These, we may not have time to go into all of those, but, uh, as it relates to Alzheimer's, Alzheimer's is characterized by a particular physiological and neuropathological finding in the brain and it's the deposit of a compound called amyloid. Uh, there is, there are also some forms where you can see another protein called the tar protein that deposits. We see those mostly in persons who have trauma-related dementia.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Okay. That's a TBI?
DR NEDD: Yes, traumatic brain injury, which is my area of specialty.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Your specialty.
DR NEDD: Yes. Yes. And we see this in a lot of the sports, uh, football players, uh, repeated, suffer repeated injuries to the head or others who might have been involved in traumatic events, uh, violence and so forth, and they develop. There is also an increased incidence of Alzheimer's in that population, but they have another form of dementia, what we call, it's a sort of post-traumatic, uh, dementia, chronic traumatic encephalopathy. You've heard of the CTE, it's normally called.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes. Yes. That’s correct.
DR NEDD: So again, those are the patients I generally treat, but I do treat a fair amount of Alzheimer's patients myself. So, in the case of Alzheimer's dementia, there are some tools that we use. There's a scan we call the PET scan, which is a physiological scan that allows us to look and see areas where there is diminished metabolism in the brain, and we actually could, there are some labels that we use, what we call radio label tools through the PET scan, where we could literally identify the amyloid protein, uh, on these diagnostic tests, we tag these radio label substances, and it binds to amyloid, and it gives off a light signal that's picked up by a camera, and we are able to see the areas in the brain where there are, um, decreased, uh, metabolic activities. So, we have some tools that we could use. We use the CAT scan. We use the PET scan. We generally see a shrinking of the brain, what we call atrophy—and, uh, those are tools that we can also use. There are others, but we can talk about them, talk about them as we move along.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yeah. So, Doc, those tools allow you to make a more accurate diagnosis in terms of what type of dementia? Is that what they can do?
DR NEDD: Over the years, we have developed clinical guidelines, and they're applied worldwide as to how we differentiate Alzheimer's from other dementia. And there are some clinical tools. Uh, we, one of the things we, one of the tools we use there some tools called biomarkers. Biomarkers are, are literally what the body gives off in terms of we can measure this, and, for example, if we take, uh, spinal fluid or what we call serial spinal fluid through a lumbar puncture, we could measure these proteins. We could measure amyloid proteins. We could measure tar proteins—and that would tell us if we see high concentration of these proteins, we are able to tell that this is a predominant Alzheimer's type.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes.
DR NEDD: So, there are other ones, I mean, there are neuropsychological testing that we could do— what we test cognitive functioning and Alzheimer's has some very characteristic presentations. For example, one of the most common presentation in Alzheimer's that we see is in the area of language dysfunction, so persons that have trouble finding words, word-finding difficulties, and can't come up with names. You know, someone who's really good at names, and all of a sudden, they just can't come up with people's names, or names of objects, or having to have other people complete the sentence. That's one of the early, early signs that we see in the process. Memory would be another one, particularly with short-term memory. That's the day-to-day memory. We'll see a decline there. Uh, and those, those, uh, types of presentations are characteristics of the brain regions that are involved.
So, for example, in the frontal part of the brain, what we call the frontal lobe, we see a kind of dementia with Alzheimer's where it's more neuro behaviour. So, a person might start crying inappropriately, sort of incongruent with the situation. They may make, uh, off-colour comments, uh, not be able to come in at the proper time during a joke or a language communication. Uh, they may use, uh, poor judgment. Uh, those are the ones that you see. Now, the ones that are temporal in the temporal lobe, which is in the sides, the temples, those tend to be more language, and they tend to have more erratic, uh, behaviour patterns. The one among the parietal, which is closer to the back, they tend to have more visual perception problems, that is, trouble distinguishing shapes and so forth. So, depending on the area of the brain that's most involved with Alzheimer's, we could literally, uh, define the symptoms. So, that's the clinical, uh, areas in terms of identifying the condition.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes. And Doc, I think that in the Caribbean, when you mentioned high blood pressure and diabetes and the, you know, all the impact that these diseases have on the brain, uh, I know in my case, my mother had, uh, vascular dementia and she was hypertensive and diabetic for quite some time, and, um, suffered TIAs, et cetera., and I think that, um, a lot of us in the Caribbean don't understand the importance, as you say, of taking the medication and watching the diet and exercise, as well, but are there any other signs that, uh, we can, um, assist our Caribbean folks with saying, this is what you need to look out for and what sort of proprietary, uh, methods we can use against this onset?
DR NEDD: So, one of the big ones is the decline in what we call the activities of daily living. And that's what the dependency on others become, uh, relevant in that sense. Uh, what you see is people forget, the person forgets how to brush their teeth, how to feed themselves, put their clothes on. Matter of fact, their ability to walk—that's the point where we see significant safety issues and the dependency on others become front and centre. That, and unfortunately in the Caribbean, we are not always prepared to handle this type of situation. It has a tremendous impact on caregivers and their own health and their ability to retain their independence. So, it's not just a disease that affects the individual— it affects everybody, everyone around.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: I know that.
DR NEDD: Uh, of course. And so, uh, in our nations in the Caribbean, we are not as prepared. We don't have many of the long-term facilities. We don't have respite places for family members to go, places to get advice, day-care centres, and so forth. So, these are some of the challenges that we see in this disease, especially as it goes to the, uh, more advanced stages.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes—and because it's incremental doc, I think sometimes you can miss the warning signs, and you may dismiss it as well. It's just a sign of regular old age. I mean, 20 years ago, people hardly, you know, spoke about this in any great depth. Now it's a lot more prevalent. Um, can you sort of walk us through the phases where you definitely need to take that family member to the doctor, especially when it, when they are in denial? Because there are times when there are such perfect moments of lucidity that you're actually questioning yourself as to whether this patient, you know, is suffering from dementia or not. How, how do we guide our family members in terms of those who have a suspicion that the parent or grandparent might be suffering with this disease, but yet is able to exhibit, uh, moments of lucidity even to the doctor within the doctor's room itself, that makes you feel stupid?
DR NEDD: That's really one of the most important questions. I think when we consider the nature of this disease from a presentation standpoint, there is a, a group of, uh, patients that we see that, we call them minimal cognitive impairment or mild cognitive impairment, and that's the early stage—and if we examine most of these patients, close to 40, 50% of those go on to develop some form of dementia. But it's often missed as you get into your sixties. So, age is perhaps the greatest risk factor for Alzheimer's. So, as we advance in age, we have to pay more attention to those issues. And they could include minor things. Like, again, I pointed out the issue of word-finding difficulties when you get to the stage where you forgetting from where you, uh, getting lost in familiar places, persons doing something routinely are not now able to do it, and, of course, that creates a lot of anxiety. One of the areas that we sometimes neglect is the neurobehavioral part, of this condition. Persons might become extremely anxious, but we don't understand why we have, we fail to understand why they're anxious, but they're also having an insight that something is different. And so, they become anxious about crowds, about getting involved in conversations. They may become quiet during a gathering when they would be normally talkative, but they have a sense of failure, and they have a fear of failure, and in many cases, you see those changes from a neurobehavioral and a neurocognitive stand, or they may become emotional about something that they would not ordinarily be emotional about or lose their temper or make a bad decision that, you know, that person is generally careful about things they do. All of a sudden, they're making erratic type of decisions and that's important because when you're dealing with things like your assets, uh, your relationships with your kids, how you allocate things, your will, for example, a lot of people might change their will inappropriately because they perceive something. And that might be the first time that they have, uh, dementing condition—Or, they may be easily persuaded by someone to do something that they would not ordinarily do.
LESLIE ANN: Correct.
DR. NEDD: All of those are some of the early presenting, you know, behaviour patterns, out of character is what we normally, uh, would see. That's the time when you need to start investigating, asking questions, and educating yourself about the condition.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes. Because their personality changes. For instance, um, that one sees, um, that they become delusional, they're constantly thinking somebody's after them, somebody's stealing from them. Somebody is, you know, just not good towards them. When, when it's the opposite, actually, um, really undermines a lot of the caregiver's ability to, you know, move this forward in a direction of empathy sometimes because it becomes overwhelming. So, what, how do the doctors deal with the caregivers from that sense, Doc, once that diagnosis is more or less confirmed, how do you shepherd these caregivers?
DR NEDD: Well, medical professionals, including doctors, are often not as educated about those dementing illnesses as you would ordinarily think, and many times, uh, most physicians aren't prepared through their medical school and postgraduate training to literally deal with families on this—and I see this in my practice all the time. So, when you go to a doctor, you must be certain that they understand the issues, because most of the times the doctor will say, oh, this is nothing. Don't worry about this, and then you sort of dismiss it. Uh, again, there are doctors who have knowledge about this, so I don't want to discredit my profession; colleagues, but it's important that you seek the right counsel, and sometimes the psychologists are very useful in this regard because they're also seeing this condition. The, the important part of detecting this disease early is so that one could institute treatment in a timely fashion and prepare this, the rest of the society and family for the next step. Sometimes this starts when someone is employed and, and, uh, they may be able to perform the job cause it's a routine, but then are elements of their interaction might become inappropriate.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Is there a difference in how you approach, uh, the patient who comes in to you unaccompanied as opposed to the patient who comes in with a family member? Um, and can you tell us, if the family member’s accompanying the patient, what sort of advance information would be helpful for the doctor in assisting the evaluation?
DR NEDD: So, there are a series of questions that we would ask both the patient and the family, and based on those questions, we're able to determine, is this factual? Is this for real? So, for example, we'll ask, uh, are you forgetting where your keys are on a frequent basis? Are you forgetting names? Are you getting lost in familiar places? Are you having trouble with mathematics word finding? The, there are specific, what we call mini mental status testing that we actually would perform on these patients to a series of questions and that'll tell us, well, they're actually scoring, uh, uh, we can literally score these tests and be able to tell whether those individuals fall outside of the range of what we consider normal. So, in this field, it's well-developed the series of questions and the type of information request, depending on the stage of the disorder, where the patient might be. So, the more advanced stages, we'll see more, uh, more, more issues involving the activities of daily living and that's where we at times focus—When, when we get to the more advanced stage.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Yes. Because with the memory lapses, for instance, if someone complains to you Doc, in their forties, you know, while I'm forgetting my keys or I'm putting, you know, I, I lose things sometimes, uh, they work in a high-stress environment as opposed to someone who is retired 65 going on 70 describing the identical symptoms. Um, would anyone give you cause to think differently or assess differently?
DR NEDD: Certainly, and that's an important point because not everyone who forget their keys, would have Alzheimer's disease or any form of dementia. So, uh, one of the challenges we see is in the processing speed, just like a computer, the brain has processing capabilities and we tend to look at what's the level of stress or is that person trying to multitask? So, if that person is single-tasking and they're forgetting, not multitasking, then that's when we kind of draw the line between the persons who have capability and those who don't, because most of the time somebody that's a younger age forgets their keys is because they have so much on their mind, or they're dealing with so many things at the same time. They're also, uh, an important part of this is something called “pseudo dementia.” Uh, “pseudo” means its false dementia—and, generally speaking, people who are depressed, anxious, can display delusion of thinking, or then a processing ability may be slowed down because they're using so many of their brain resources to deal with an emotional situation like a breakup or death that they're not able to focus or require. They're not able to pay attention and they could look identical to a person with Alzheimer's disease or another form of dementia in those places. In those cases, we treat the depression, we treat the anxiety, and oftentimes those symptoms disappear. So again, it's important from a clinical standpoint to be able, able to distinguish those types of conditions.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Very much so, Doc, thanks for that. Doc, one of the painful parts of this disease is how long that patient, that family member can go through this deterioration period. We've seen some who've met their demise within a short number of years, and some who live 10, 15, 20 years, um, and still going. Um, is there any medical explanation, uh, for the difference in the survival? And this question brings into mind I, I think a lot of, uh, ethical issues and dilemma, especially if that deterioration, the mental cognitive deterioration is commensurate with physical deterioration. How, how does a doctor like you deal with this and what advice do you have to offer?
DR NEDD: So, there are many factors that determine the longevity and the quality of life that a person with Alzheimer's would enjoy, so, for example, if let's suppose you had a traumatic brain injury to the head and you develop Alzheimer's, you’re likely to progress at a lot faster rate if you have diabetes, hypertension, big one is alcoholism. So, people that drink a lot of alcohol, uh, are most subject to develop Alzheimer's disease, and when they develop the condition, if they continue to drink, then that also increases the, um, the, the progression in the disease. So, for, for example, someone who exercises on a regular basis, who eats well, maintain a healthy diet, maintain their weight, uh, persons with sleep apnea would have a more, um, progressive disease; but the ones who take good care of themselves are likely to progress at a much slower rate.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: That's interesting. Um, I know that some families have been so impacted, um, by the length of time just watching the family member deteriorate and decline and not knowing what to do because there isn't really much. Um, what is the treatment that's available now, Doc, because it was almost a disease of doom and, and, and death. There was absolutely no hope, no optimism for cures, but I think medicine is advancing. Is there room for optimism? Is there a rainbow in this diagnosis?
DR NEDD: So, depending on where you live in the world, you might have access to certain treatment modalities that are better than others, but there are what we call the non-pharmacological, um, treatment modalities, and those are things like I pointed out—exercise, staying cognitively fit, meaning that you are doing mental tasks that keeps your brain working, uh, your diet. There are cognitive, uh, therapies, and there are some newer treatments that are, uh, there is something called transcranial magnetic stimulation. It helps with managing some depression and other areas. We can, if you are depressed and anxious, the, the disease tends to progress, uh, in a faster way. So those are some of the non-pharmacological treatment. So, for many years, the only treatment we had was how we've had, was the treatment of, uh, what's called the anti-cholinesterase inhibitors—and that's a big word— but yes.
There are neurotransmitters in the brain. These are chemicals and neurochemicals that literally cause the brain to work better. They create more ability for the, they allow the brain to process information at a faster rate and what happens, those nerve cells that produce these chemicals drop out during Alzheimer's. So, what we do, we give these drugs to inhibit the breakdown of the chemicals that are produced by these remaining nerves, so when, when the nerves produce the chemicals, they cause the effect, there's an enzyme called a cholinesterase that literally breaks down those neurotransmitters. So, what we do in science is we give these drugs to prevent these, um, uh, what do you call acetylcholine is the name of the neurotransmitters from breaking down. So, they stay around at a longer, for a longer time, causing the neurons to work better, and the nerve cells to work better. So, we give those drugs, but the rate at which the nerve cells die, uh, versus the rate at which we able to prevent, uh, uh, the production or maintain the production of those chemicals is, has to be in balance.
So, when the nerve cells dies at a rate that they're not able to produce enough, then the disease gets worse. So, there is a limited amount of time when these drugs are effective, and we generally use them in the mild to moderate forms. When you get to severe, they are less likely. One of them is called the “Donepezil” uh, which is also known as, um, “Aricept” Uh, there, there are others. That's the most common one that we use. We use another drug that also, uh, prevent the nerve cells from literally dying or reduces the rate of dying for those cells. Uh, the drug is called “Namenda” and it also has to do with the, the, where the, the, the receptors where these neurotransmitters bind it, uh, uh, helps with the access of those, uh, those chemicals to the, the nerve cells in order to have the effect, so it reduces the nerve cells from burnout, so to speak—And again, those medications are only useful in the early stage. So, more recently, uh, there's been some studies done looking at the deposits that's created, the amyloid deposit and the tower deposits when there is, when Alzheimer's, uh, presents itself, and those are proteins that come from the breakdown, those proteins cause further damage to the nerve cells. So, there's been some new immune therapy that have been recently introduced too that we, that offer promise. Uh, there's a lot of controversy on the use of those agents. They're, uh, uh, what you call disease modifying therapy. The other therapies were mainly sort of palliative, but these therapies might, we may find that they may reduce not just the progression, but also reduce the death of the cells. Uh, there are, uh, there are sort of antibody, they attack, uh, the amyloid, it's an antibody against the amyloid that that, that are produced.
It's an immune therapy, and this is popular in cancer and other diseases that we are treating these days—so, we are borrowing from those other, uh, treatment modalities and introducing this method of treatment to the Alzheimer's. So, this offers a significant amount of promise for the future, and trust that in the next, in my lifetime at least, that we come up with these better treatments, that we are able to not just slow down the disease, but literally modify. We can't cure it yet because, uh, as we, uh, which we have not spoken about, is there are certain genes that are often associated with Alzheimer's when the so-called APOE4 GENE. And we are still trying to learn how we could modify those genes to prevent them from taking effect at certain times in our lives, and once these genes are turned on, then this death of the nerve cells in the brain can start taking place, and, of course, uh, Alzheimer's disease does have some genetic, uh, propensities predisposition in terms of inheritance and so forth. Uh, you, you already alluded to the, uh, the ethical, the bioethical issues associated with this. So, knowing about that gene, its presence, intervening early, and using some of those modalities could help to not just reduce cell death, but literally slow down diseases.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: So, are these medications and the treatments you described, um, easily accessible? Is it, uh, you know, prohibitively expensive? Uh, what, what is the hope for us?
DR NEDD: Very expensive. And even in, in developed nations, those, most of these medications are only available in clinical trials. That's research—or when they're available, you have to pay out of pocket. They could cost anywhere from 20 to a hundred thousand dollars or more to get this type of treatment, and we hope that world will make these treatments available to the general public because, you know, 50 million people, uh, uh, worldwide affected by this condition. So, hopefully, pharmaceutical industry and the governments of the world would make these types of treatments just like they did with COVID vaccine available to the public.
LESLIE-ANN: Yes, because they show that it can be done, and we do need global collaborative approaches with PAHO or World Health Organization and the various governments, particularly those in the developed countries to assist the communities in smaller states and poorer, undeveloped states like ours. I mean, what, what does that say for the Caribbean? Unless you can afford the insurance, if you can get it, or these expensive treatments out of pocket, uh, we are really facing a, a dooms day with this disease. So, Doc, that brings me perhaps to the final, uh, question. Um, looking ahead, uh, how can the Caribbean be better placed, uh, to support Alzheimer's and dementia patients? And, and what recommendations do you have for us, uh, within the archipelago?
DR NEDD: So, my view is that there are some basic things we must do with Caribbean health, and from a preventative standpoint, if we solve the problem of managing diabetes, hypertension, alcoholism, uh, we will go a long way towards managing the onset progression of this disease. Outside of that, early detection. Paying attention to families and what they're going through is very important, uh, at this stage. Now, preparation on a more policy level for managing the diseases of aging would be something that I think Caribbean governments and healthcare industry in the Caribbean could do, and so, we now in the Caribbean have very little availability of long-term care resources, including facilities, uh, caregiver situations, and people like myself who might be returning to the Caribbean to live in our retirement years, wanna know that there are adequate healthcare services available for the geriatric or the aging population.
I believe that outside of cancer, which as you know, is one of, we, we have in the region, we have a significantly fast-growing incident rate in the Caribbean based on WHO statistics, diseases of the aging could also rank close to conditions like cancer. And so, from an economic standpoint, uh, Caribbean governments must see healthcare as a critical part of the expenditure in the next decade and plan payment models and treatment models. Uh, in fact, when you think about it, you look at the Caribbean, we have in the English-speaking Caribbean, an estimated 6 million people, and we have maybe somewhere between seven and eight neurologists. These are like myself, who treat conditions like this, so we don't even have enough specialists available in the Caribbean to be able to handle this. We need neuropsychologists, physical therapists, speech and language pathologists—People who are trained to manage these types of conditions. We also need a nursing infrastructure with, uh, support for families, uh, to be able to provide this type of service. Just the field of geriatric medicine needs to be better developed to be able to understand and deal with the issues of the aging. So clearly, there's a lot that we could do moving forward to be able to address these conditions because at one point or the other, we will all be aged if you live to that point, and so, it's important that we make those decisions now, for not just our generation, but for the next generation.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Very much so. Doc, I, I will tell you this Doc, um, respectfully, I do feel that sometimes our medical experts, uh, who are from the Caribbean and of Caribbean origin, can do a little bit more in advocacy and lobbying, uh, to assist us within the archipelago in handling some of these medical, um, issues and crises. Because most of you do want to retire home and you put off that decision because of the lack of the healthcare and the healthcare infrastructure and the availability of the expertise. So, I'm pleading with you, Doc, to also do your part as much as you can in garnering the resources of your Caribbean counterparts in mounting an intervention for these chronic diseases that are crippling the Caribbean communities, especially our older communities, and even the younger ones with cancer. Um, I think more can be done—But, I want to thank you so much for joining me on Seon 180 this morning to talk about this very dreaded disease. I appreciate the effort and the time you've taken to impart your expertise.
DR NEDD: Well, thank you, and I appreciate the show and what you're doing to help Caribbean people as it relates to improving the quality of life. You're doing a great work.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Thank you,
DR NEDD: Congratulations.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Thank you very much. I appreciate it. And uh, have a very good Christmas holiday season.
DR NEDD: I wish you the same.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: Thank you.
DR NEDD: Thank you.
LESLIE-ANN SEON: I want to thank Dr. Nedd so very much for joining us this morning on this very important topic of Alzheimer's and dementia, unravelling it for you, me, and the family. We’ve learned quite a lot, uh, today and this is a very personal podcast episode for me as I went through this myself with my dearly departed mother. So, for me, this was quite personal and I'm sure for many in our, listening and viewing audience, this is also personal for you. This is part one of this very important topic. Part two will be dealing with the caregiving aspect and the toll that it takes on the caregivers. Listeners, I hope you appreciated the information that we have been able to impart to you here today, and I thank sincerely, again, Dr. Nedd, for joining us on this topic.
Thank you for being with us on this podcast Seon 180. This is the end of season three and we continue to learn from our community of professionals across the region who've been able to grace our platform. We would've expected a longer season three, but a very bad cold bug affected the host and prevented us from recording additional episodes, but, as we end this season, we embrace the new season to come—the Christmas holiday season, and I want to take this opportunity to wish you and your family and friends a very happy, enjoyable, and peaceful Christmas. From pastels to Ponche creme, from Sorel to ginger beer, from black cake to pepper pot. I'm wishing you a very happy Christmas season.
Cheers to you all. Be safe everybody.
END
