| Summary: | Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a severe neurodegenerative disease that primarily affects the elderly population. Recently, epidemiological studies have pointed to significant increase in the disease cases within the world population, and therefore, it is important to pay more attention to it. The most distinctive symptom of AD is an impairment of memory, especially its episodic component. Apart from this, sleep-wake rhythm disturbance is also very burdensome symptom of this disease. An increasing sleep fragmentation during the night and an increasing number of naps during the day in AD patients represents one of the biggest complications for home caregivers. Therefore, sleep problems are one of the most common reasons for a permanent hospitalization of patients with AD. Apart from these difficulties for the patient's surroundings, the irregular and altered sleep-wake rhythm has also many negative physiological impacts on the patient's health. The alternation in sleep and waking follows a prominent daily rhythm. The sleep-wake rhythm is driven by a circadian system and, therefore, the episodes of sleep and waking regularly alternate with approximately 24h period even in a non-periodic environment. Master circadian clock is located in the suprachiasmatic nucleus of hypothalamus (SCN). SCN is an...
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