As longevity increases, society will face a silent epidemic of idiopathic dementias. The concept, Alzheimer's disease, reflects a cumbersome and vaguely-defined cluster of signs, symptoms and other variables which might more appropriately be labelled as the idiopathic dementias, Alzheimer-type or IDAT. Diagnosis, which is made by exclusion and treatment, primarily custodial, demonstrates the complex nature and unfortunate prognosis of the problem. Dramatic progress, nevertheless, has been made in various scientific aspects of the issue, namely, in histology, genetics and neurochemistry. The resulting evidence warrants further speculation on the role of central cholinergic neurotransmission in cognitive functioning.
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