Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have helped identify many of the biomarkers for Alzheimer\u2019s disease that could potentially predict which patients will develop the disorder later in life. Now, studying spinal fluid samples and health data from 201 research participants at the Charles F. and Joanne Knight Alzheimer\u2019s Disease Research Center, the researchers have shown the markers are accurate predictors of Alzheimer\u2019s years before symptoms develop.
\n‘We wanted to see if one marker was better than the other in predicting which of our participants would get cognitive impairment and when they would get it,’ said Catherine Roe, PhD, research assistant professor of neurology. ‘We found no differences in the accuracy of the biomarkers.’
\nThe researchers evaluated markers such as the buildup of amyloid plaques in the brain, newly visible thanks to an imaging agent developed in the last decade; levels of various proteins in the cerebrospinal fluid, such as the amyloid fragments that are the principal ingredient of brain plaques; and the ratios of one protein to another in the cerebrospinal fluid, such as different forms of the brain cell structural protein tau.
\nThe markers were studied in volunteers whose ages ranged from 45 to 88. On average, the data available on study participants spanned four years, with the longest recorded over 7.5 years.
\nThe researchers found that all of the markers were equally good at identifying subjects who were likely to develop cognitive problems and at predicting how soon they would become noticeably impaired.
\nNext, the scientists paired the biomarkers data with demographic information, testing to see if sex, age, race, education and other factors could improve their predictions.
\n‘Sex, age and race all helped to predict who would develop cognitive impairment,’ Roe said. ‘Older participants, men and African Americans were more likely to become cognitively impaired than those who were younger, female and Caucasian.’
\nRoe described the findings as providing more evidence that scientists can detect Alzheimer\u2019s disease years before memory loss and cognitive decline become apparent.
\n‘We can better predict future cognitive impairment when we combine biomarkers with patient characteristics,’ she said. ‘Knowing how accurate biomarkers are is important if we are going to some day be able to treat Alzheimer\u2019s before symptoms and slow or prevent the disease.’
\nClinical trials are already underway at Washington University and elsewhere to determine if treatments prior to symptoms can prevent or delay inherited forms of Alzheimer\u2019s disease. Reliable biomarkers for Alzheimer\u2019s should one day make it possible to test the most successful treatments in the much more common sporadic forms of Alzheimer\u2019s.\nWashington University School of Medicine<\/link>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Scientists at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have helped identify many of the biomarkers for Alzheimer\u2019s disease that could potentially predict which patients will develop the disorder later in life. Now, studying spinal fluid samples and health data from 201 research participants at the Charles F. and Joanne Knight Alzheimer\u2019s Disease Research […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1865"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1865\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1865"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1865"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/clinlabint.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1865"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}