
Welcome to the online home for Rusty’s Regulators. Our group helps to raise funds to find an End for Alzheimer’s Disease. Our group is named in honor of Tom “Rusty” Kelley, a loving husband, father, grandfather, brother and friend, who was diagnosed with this terrible disease in 2005.
We lost Tom on November 17th, 2019.
In his honor we will continue to fight to find a cure for this terrible disease.
We have created this page to make it easier for you (and us) to get the word out about fundraisers we are setting up to help fight this disease. We have four different through out the year, an Easter fundraiser, a Flock My Yard fundraiser, a Halloween fundraiser and a Bingo Night fundraiser. So please come back often and see what we are up to and we are always open to new fundraising ideas.
Alzheimer’s is a type of dementia that causes problems with memory, thinking and behavior. Symptoms usually develop slowly and get worse over time, becoming severe enough to interfere with daily tasks. Here are some facts about the disease:
- Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, a general term for memory loss and other cognitive abilities serious enough to interfere with daily life. Alzheimer’s disease accounts for 60 to 80 percent of dementia cases.
- Alzheimer’s is not a normal part of aging. The greatest known risk factor is increasing age, and the majority of people with Alzheimer’s are 65 and older. But Alzheimer’s is not just a disease of old age. Approximately 200,000 Americans under the age of 65 have younger-onset Alzheimer’s disease (also known as early-onset Alzheimer’s).
- Alzheimer’s worsens over time. Alzheimer’s is a progressive disease, where dementia symptoms gradually worsen over a number of years. In its early stages, memory loss is mild, but with late-stage Alzheimer’s, individuals lose the ability to carry on a conversation and respond to their environment. Alzheimer’s is the sixth leading cause of death in the United States. Those with Alzheimer’s live an average of eight years after their symptoms become noticeable to others, but survival can range from four to 20 years, depending on age and other health conditions.
- Alzheimer’s has no current cure, but treatments for symptoms are available and research continues. Although current Alzheimer’s treatments cannot stop Alzheimer’s from progressing, they can temporarily slow the worsening of dementia symptoms and improve quality of life for those with Alzheimer’s and their caregivers. Today, there is a worldwide effort under way to find better ways to treat the disease, delay its onset, and prevent it from developing.