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Scientists are approaching a long-sought goal: a blood test designed to screen people for signs of possible Alzheimer's disease and other forms of dementia.
Today, at the international conference of the Alzheimer's Association, half a dozen research groups have given new results on various experimental tests, including one that seems to indicate at 88% the risk of disease of Alzheimer's disease. # 39; Alzheimer's.
Doctors hope to be able to use something during routine exams, where most dementia symptoms are assessed, to determine who needs more in-depth testing.
Current tools such as brain scans and cerebrospinal fluid tests are too expensive or impractical for regular checkups.
"We need something faster and more dirty – it does not have to be perfect" to be useful for screening, said Maria Carrillo, Scientific Officer of the Alzheimer's Association. .
Dr. Richard Hodes, director of the National Institute on Aging, described the new findings as "very promising" and said blood tests would soon be used to select and monitor people for government-funded studies. federal, although it will take a little more time to establish their value routine medical care.
"In the past year, we have witnessed a dramatic acceleration of these tests," he said. "It happened at a much faster pace than any of us could have expected."
It can not happen too soon for patients like Tom Doyle, a 66-year-old former University of Chicago professor, who has undergone two spinal fluid tests since he developed memory problems there four years ago.
He was first told that he did not have Alzheimer's disease, then he did it. He was eventually diagnosed with various problems – Lewy body dementia and Parkinson's disease.
"They probably would have been able to diagnose me accurately years ago had they had a blood test," said Doyle, who represents patients on the board of the Alzheimer's Association.
About 50 million people worldwide have dementia and Alzheimer's disease is the most common form.
There is no cure; current medications temporarily relieve symptoms. Dozens of hoped-for treatments have failed. Doctors believe that studies could have recruited people after too many brain injuries were sustained and that they included too many people with problems other than Alzheimer's disease.
A blood test – rather than subjective estimates of thinking skills – could allow the right people to participate more quickly in the studies.
One of the experimental blood tests measures the abnormal versions of the protein that forms the brain plaques that characterize Alzheimer's disease.
Last year, Japanese researchers published a study and today, they presented the results of validation tests on 201 people with Alzheimer 's disease, of other types. dementia, mild impairment or the absence of symptoms.
The blood test results closely matched those of the most used tests: three types of brain scans and a mental assessment exam, said Dr. Akinori Nakamura of the National Center for Geriatrics and Gerontology in Obu, Japan.
The test correctly identified 92% of people with Alzheimer's disease and correctly excluded 85% of unaffected people, for an overall accuracy of 88%.
Shimadzu Corp. has the rights to the test and is working to market it, said Nakamura.
Another experimental test focuses on the light of neurofilaments, a protein that is a marker of nerve damage. Abdul Hye of King's College London presented the results of a study comparing blood concentrations of 2,300 people with various neurological disorders – Alzheimer's disease, other dementias, Parkinson's disease , depression, multiple sclerosis, Lou Gehrig's disease – as well as healthy people.
Levels were significantly higher in eight cases and only 2% of healthy people exceeded the threshold of concern. The test does not reveal what trouble anyone has, but it can help rule out one when the symptoms may be psychological or due to other problems.
Later at the conference, Dr. Randall Bateman, from the University of Washington School of Medicine in St. Louis, will give new results on a blood test that he helped develop and that the university has patented and licensed to C2N Diagnostics, a company he co-founded.
Like the Japanese test, it measures the abnormal Alzheimer's protein and the new results will show how well the test reflects what brain tests show on nearly 500 people.
"Everyone finds the same thing (…), the results are remarkably similar from one country to another, from one technique to the other," Bateman said. whose work is supported by the US Government and the Alzheimer's Association. He estimates that a screening test could be in three years time.
What is the point of healing?
A survey by NORC's Associated Press-Center for Public Affairs last year found that most Americans would like to know if they carry a gene related to a disease, even if incurable.
"What people want above all else is a diagnosis" they have symptoms, said Jonathan Schott of University College London. "What we do not like is not knowing what's going on."
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