Alzheimer and his disease: a brief history.

More than 100 years ago, Alois Alzheimer first described the clinical and pathological features of an unusual brain disease during the meeting of the Society of Southwest German Psychiatrists in Tübingen: the patient, Auguste Deter, suffered memory loss, disorientation, hallucinations and delusions and died at the age of 55. In 1910, Emil Kraepelin named the condition with the eponym of "Alzheimer's disease" (AD) that is, now, the most common neurodegenerative disease with more than 25 million cases worldwide and a major medical problem nearing catastrophic levels. The present article discusses Alzheimer's work in the context of his life and time.