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Decades ago, hundreds of nuns and priests made an extraordinary decision: they agreed to donate their brains to science, hoping to help solve the mysteries of Alzheimer's disease and other diseases. Now, a study that used their donations gives some clues. It reveals that high blood pressure at the end of life could harm the brain.
Autopsies on nearly 1300 elderly people, including about 640 clergy, found more signs of damage and one of the hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease.
The study does not prove the cause and effect, and it does not yet provide a comparison of dementia rates or its most common form, Alzheimer's disease. take more time to analyze. But this calls into question a theory that high pressure is not as harmful in old age as when it is younger.
"We can not be alarmist, these are preliminary data" that need to be validated by others, said study leader Dr. Zoe Arvanitakis of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago . According to this study, it is far too early to make recommendations on blood pressure in the elderly.
The research began in 1994 and brought together people from three studies on aging who agreed to give their autopsy. Religious Orders Study of Catholic clergy throughout the United States. All were over 65 years old and without known dementia at first and were followed until their death – at an average age of 89 and after an average of eight years in the study.
Two-thirds had high blood pressure, defined as a peak Pressure was measured once a year during the study – a strength of this work compared to previous research that relied on people to say Whether they had high pressure or not
After the death of each participant, the researchers examined their brains for dead tissue areas caused by a lack of blood. These affected areas can be tiny and cause no symptoms, they are sometimes called "silent strokes".
About half of the participants had one or more of them, and the risk was higher for those with higher blood levels. pressure. For example, people with a mean score greater than 147 had a 46% higher risk of having one or more of the negative points than those with a higher average reading of 134. People with lower blood pressure readings had also a greater risk
The researchers also found a link between higher pressure and one of the signs of Alzheimer's disease – the entanglements of a protein called tau – but not another hallmark of Alzheimer's, amyloid plaques. "It's a pretty solid study," said James Hendrix, director of global scientific initiatives at the Alzheimer's Association. "The autopsy data is really powerful" and have been the norm to diagnose Alzheimer's disease for many years, he says.
With Alzheimer's disease, changes in the brain occur a decade or more before the symptoms he said that the damage was well before the age when these people enrolled in the brain. ;study.
How high pressure could it hurt?
"High blood pressure reduces the risk of blockage of blood vessels". another independent expert, Dr. David Knopman from Mayo Clinic. The work shows that "the treatment of blood pressure throughout life is important."
Knopman is a spokesperson for the American Academy of Neurology, whose journal, Neurology, published the study. Federal Grants Paid for Work
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Marilynn Marchione can be followed on Twitter at http://twitter.com/MMarchioneAP
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The Department of Health and Science of the United States. Associated Press receives support from Howard Hughes Medical Institute Department of Science Education. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
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