[Alzheimer and the discovery of Alzheimer's disease].

Abstract

Alzheimer was born in Germany in 1864. In 1887, Alzheimer graduated with a medical doctor degree at the University of Würzburg. In 1888, Alzheimer began to work in the Community Hospital for Mental and Epileptic Patients in Frankfurt am Main for 14 years. During this time, Alzheimer published the six-volume Histologic and Histopathologic Studies of the Cerebral Cortex, with co-author Franz Nissl. In 1903, Alzheimer came to work in the Royal Psychiatric Clinic of the University of Munich. One year later, he published his postdoctoral paper of Histological Studies about the Differential Diagnosis of Progressive Paralysis in 1904. In 1912, Alzheimer was provided the chair of psychiatry at the University of Breslau. On the way to Breslau, Alzheimer got sick, and eventually died in 1915. In 1906, Alzheimer found numerous amyloid plaques and neurofibrillary tangles in the brain of a patient called Auguste under the microscope. In November of the same year, Alzheimer gave a lecture about Auguste's case at the 37(th) Conference of South-West German Psychiatrists in Tübingen, which received little attention. In 1910, Kraepelin mentioned "Alzheimer's disease" for the first time to name the disease of what Auguste got in the 8th edition of Handbook of Psychiatry. Therefore, Alzheimer achieved worldwide recognition.