ABSTRACT
In 1906, at a meeting of the South West German Society of Alienists, Dr. Alois Alzheimer presented the case of Auguste D., a 51-year-old woman who had been admitted to a hospital in 1901 with an unusual cluster of symptoms that included reduced comprehension and memory, aphasia, disorientation, unpredictable behavior, paranoia, auditory hallucinations, and pronounced psychosocial impairment. When Dr. Alzheimer first observed her in 1903, Auguste D. was bedridden, incontinent, and was becoming increasingly disoriented, delusional, and incoherent. She eventually required assistance to be fed, was unable to speak, and was often hostile. She died on April 8, 1906. Alzheimer published this case report, entitled “On an Unusual Illness of the Cerebral Cortex,” (Alzheimer et al., 1995). He reported brain atrophy and also wrote, “Distributed all over the cortex, but especially numerous in the upper layers, there are minute miliary foci which are caused by the deposition of a special substance in the cortex.” This “special substance” comprises extracellular proteinaceous deposits (plaques) of the amyloid β-protein (Aβ) (Alzheimer et al., 1995; Masters et al., 1985). Plaques, and intracellular deposits of tau protein (neurofibrillary tangles [NFT]), have remained pathognomonic histopathologic features of AD since Emil Kraepelin named the disease in 1910 (Kraepelin Emil, 2007).
