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Robin Williams died seven years ago. In recent years, he has struggled with dementia with Lewy bodies. A progressive, incurable disease led the actor to suicide. However, during his lifetime, neither he nor his relatives knew exactly what was wrong with him.
- Dementia with Lewy bodies is a neurodegenerative disease that leads to changes in the central nervous system
- It is one of the dementia diseases and is very often confused with Parkinson’s disease
- The disease is difficult to recognize. An example of a person with undiagnosed dementia with Lewy bodies was Robin Williams
- This is the seventh anniversary of the actor’s death
- More current information can be found on the Onet homepage
Robin William died seven years ago
Recently it was the anniversary of the death of Robin Williams. The actor committed suicide on August 11, 2014. He was 63 years old.
Robin Williams was one of Hollywood’s most beloved actors. Mainly associated with comedy roles, although he was able to show talent in dramatic films. Initially starring in television series, he gained more publicity for the great role of John Keating in the 1989 film “Dead Poets Society”.
He won an Oscar for his role in “Mutineer by Choice,” and had three more Academy Award nominations, as well as four Golden Globes, two Emmys and five Grammy Awards. Other famous films with his participation include «Mrs. Doubtfire», «Fisher King», «Jumanji», «Night at the Museum», «Insomnia» or «Good Morning, Vietnam».
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In the last years of his life, he suffered from a neurodegenerative disease whose symptoms are similar to Parkinson’s or Alzheimer’s diseases. Progressive dementia and less and less control over his own body and mind led Williams to suicide.
Robin Williams – not only depression
Robin Williams, often associated on the screen with the roles of jokers, parodists and mockers, struggled with many diseases in his private life. He was addicted to alcohol and drugs and suffered from depression. He had also been treated for Parkinson’s disease for some time, but as it turned out with the documentary “Hello, Robin”, which tells about the last weeks of his life, the diagnosis was wrong.
Robin WIlliams had dementia with Lewy bodies. The first symptoms appeared two years before the actor’s death.
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– Without knowing it, we fought a terminal disease. An incurable disease. The damage Lewy’s bodies did to Robin’s brain was one of the worst cases in medical history. At the same time, he remained strong in spirit all the time – said Susan Schneider Williams, his wife.
The changes in the actor’s behavior worried his loved ones, he himself did not know what was happening to him.
“Something is wrong with me, I am no longer myself,” Williams was said to have said towards the end of his life.
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“Robin and I knew there was a lot more going on than depression or addiction.” Robin was right to say to me, “I just want to restart my brain.” I promised him that we would get to the truth and I did not know it would happen after his death – Schneider said in September in the program “Today”.
Dementia with Lewy bodies – what is it?
Dementia with Lewy bodies (dementia with Lewy bodies, DLB) is a primary neurodegenerative disease that belongs to the group of synucleinopathies. It is characterized by the presence in the cytoplasm of nerve cells – the so-called Lewy bodies, i.e. eosinophilic inclusions composed mainly of the protein alpha-synuclein. The prevalence of DLB is not fully known; in many studies it is mentioned as the second most common cause of dementia in people over 65, after Alzheimer’s disease. However, DLB is rarely recognized by neurologists and psychiatrists – we read in the “Polish neurological review”.
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Visual hallucinations dominate among neuropsychiatric symptoms. In patients with DLB, more often than in other diseases of this type, symptoms of the misdiagnosis and delusions syndrome (the patient talks with a mirror, TV, does not recognize relatives, etc.) and disorders of REM sleep behavior.
Other common symptoms with dementia with Lewy bodies include:
- a tendency to fall, faint
- tremors (similar to Parkinson’s disease)
- swallowing problems
- stumbling while walking
- sleep disturbances, nightmares,
- auditory hallucinations,
- bouts of crying
- memory problems,
- temporary disturbance of consciousness,
- urinary incontinence
- depression.
Dementia with Lew bodies is a progressive condition. There are currently no medications that can cure the sick person or stop the disease, they can only slow its progression.
It is not a hereditary disease, although it may appear in the patient’s family. It most often affects people over 50.
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