One of the earliest known impairments caused by Alzheimer’s disease - loss of sense of smell – can be restored by removing a plaque-forming protein in a mouse model of the disease, a study led by a Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine researcher finds.
When a person with mild cognitive impairment is agitated or restless, caregivers can expect to find they are more edgy as well. This heightens the effect of elevated stress levels on caregivers' own bodies, placing them at risk for current and future health problems.
Studies have shown that people who are overweight in middle age are more likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease decades later than people at normal weight, yet researchers have also found that people in the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s disease are more likely to have a lower body mass index (BMI). A current study examines this relationship between Alzheimer’s disease and BMI. The study is published in the November 22, 2011, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Sluggish recycling of a protein-slicing enzyme could promote Alzheimer’s disease, according to a new study in The Journal of Cell Biology.
Since the approval of four cholinesterase inhibitors in the 1990s and memantine in 2003, there have been no new treatments for Alzheimer’s disease. Against this backdrop, Paul Aisen of the University of California, San Diego, opened the 4th International Conference on Clinical Trials on Alzheimer's Disease (CTAD) on 3 November 2011 in San Diego, California. Aisen’s keynote address, now available on Alzforum tracks the evolution of Alzheimer's trials over the past two decades. He plots a new phase forward, with researchers having a better handle on how to tackle the disease.
Researchers from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania found a new way of diagnosing and tracking Alzheimer's disease, using an innovative magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) technique called Arterial spin labeling (ASL) to measure changes in brain function.
Hospital patients over 65 who are referred for a psychiatric consultation and found to have delirium are more likely than those without delirium to die within one year following diagnosis, according to a new study published in General Hospital Psychiatry.
A new evidence review from the Netherlands finds that a psychotherapy technique called cognitive reframing can help reduce caregivers' stress when they are caring for loved ones with dementia.
UCLA researchers used a unique brain scan to assess the levels of amyloid plaques and tau tangles in older adults with a type of severe depression called major depressive disorder (MDD).
A rigorous evaluation of the scientific literature reveals that the jury is still out when it comes to hormone replacement therapy and a woman’s risk for Alzheimer’s disease. The results are reported in the AlzRisk database.
A new study shows a person’s stroke risk profile, which includes high blood pressure, smoking, and diabetes, may also be helpful in predicting whether a person will develop memory and thinking problems later in the life. The research is published in the November 8, 2011, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
A second clinical trial of the medical food Souvenaid® confirmed that daily intake of the nutritional intervention improves memory in people with mild Alzheimer's disease (AD). Results of the trial – called Souvenir II – were presented at the 4th International Conference on Clinical Trials in Alzheimer's Disease (CTAD) in San Diego, California on Friday, November 4, 2011 by Philip Scheltens, MD, PhD, Professor of Cognitive Neurology and Director of the Alzheimer Center at the VU University Medical Center in Amsterdam.
New research shows people with dementia who have a stroke are more likely to become disabled and not return home compared to people who didn’t have dementia at the time they had a stroke. The study is published in the November 1, 2011, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
In a development that sheds new light on the pathology of Alzheimer’s disease (AD), Whitehead Institute scientists have identified connections between genetic risk factors for the disease and the effects of a peptide toxic to nerve cells in the brains of AD patients.
Scientists outline new methods for better understanding links between specific proteins and the risks associated with Alzheimer’s disease in an article co-authored by University of Alabama researchers and publishing today in Science Express.
The neurodegeneration associated with Alzheimer's disease is thought to be caused by small, soluble A-beta complexes, partly through their ability to induce excess calcium influx into cells, which stimulates cell death. A new study reveals that A-beta oligomers elevate calcium by forming calcium-permeable pores in the plasma membrane.
A team of physicians and scientists from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine and elsewhere describe using a combination of broadly available medical tests to produce a much improved predictive picture of the likelihood of impending AD in patients with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) – an intermediate stage between the expected cognitive decline of normal aging and the more pronounced decline of dementia.
An in-depth report on Alzforum provides a 360-degree tour of all aspects of Alzheimer’s disease research—from the current state of knowledge about the disease process, to the questions and challenges facing researchers at this point, to prospects for future advances, particularly in the wake of recent treatment failures.
A news feature in Alzforum explains the impact of new guidelines from the European Medicines Agency for selecting volunteers in clinical trials of Alzheimer’s disease drugs.
The month of October is designated as Lewy Body Dementia month. Lewy body dementia (LBD) is a degenerative brain disease that progressively impairs thinking and movement, while impacting behavior and sleep. Although it affects an estimated 1.3 million people in the U.S., LBD is under-recognized, under-diagnosed and under-treated. It is most often misdiagnosed as Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s disease.
A tiny piece of a critical receptor that fuels the brain and without which sentient beings cannot live has been discovered by University at Buffalo scientists as a promising new drug target for Alzheimer’s and other neurodegenerative diseases.
Addressing the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s disease, before a patient shows outward signs of cognitive problems, has sometimes been a challenge for physicians and researchers, in part because they have not been using common and specific terms to describe the disease’s initial phases.
People who rate their health as poor or fair appear to be significantly more likely to develop dementia later in life, according to a study published in the October 5, 2011, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
A team of scientists, led by Johns Hopkins researchers, say they may have found a way to predict how quickly patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) will lose cognitive function by looking at ratios of two fatty compounds in their blood. The finding, they say, could provide useful information to families and caregivers, and might also suggest treatment targets for this heartbreaking and incurable neurodegenerative disorder.
It seems that there is no shortage of bad news when it comes to possible treatments for Alzheimer’s disease. A Webinar discussion and a news article in Alzforum now provide a unique perspective from the trenches and, contrary to what’s portrayed in the general media, researchers’ views are cautious but upbeat.
A marker for Alzheimer’s disease rises and falls in the spinal fluid in a daily pattern that echoes the sleep cycle. The pattern is strongest in healthy young people and reinforces a link between increased Alzheimer’s risk and inadequate sleep that had been discovered in animal models.
New guidelines call for pathologists to look for possible signs of Alzheimer’s disease in the brains of deceased patients, regardless of whether those patients had had symptoms of dementia in their lives. This means that when a parent or loved one dies, family members may find out for the first time that a relative had telltale signs of Alzheimer’s disease.
Scientists at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School have found that a common cancer protein leads a second, totally different life in normal adult brain cells: It helps regulates memory formation and may be implicated in Alzheimer's disease.
University of Kentucky spinoff company CoPlex Therapeutics has announced a global license with Hawthorn Pharmaceuticals to develop a treatment for Alzheimer's disease.
This is National Adult Day Services Week, and if you take care of an elderly loved one, it is a good time to see how adult day care centers can help your whole family.
Frontotemporal dementia and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease -- two fatal neurodegenerative disease with distinct but sometimes overlapping symptoms -- are triggered by a common mutation in many cases, according to researchers who say they have identified the mutated gene.
North American investigators led by neuroscientists at Mayo Clinic in Florida have found a genetic abnormality they say is the most common cause of two different but related familial forms of neurodegenerative disease — frontotemporal dementia (FTD) and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.
UCLA scientists discovered that a key signaling pathway plays an important role in frontotemporal dementia and may offer a potential target for treatment of the devastating brain disorder, which accounts for one in four cases of early-onset dementia.
Results of a new study at the University of Massachusetts Amherst suggest that people in midlife who are at genetic risk for Alzheimer’s disease might show subtle differences in the speed at which they process information compared to those who do not have particular genetic risk.
People with diabetes appear to be at a significantly increased risk of developing dementia, according to a study published in the September 20, 2011, print issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
World Alzheimer’s Day is Sept. 21, 2011. Dr. Gustavo C. Roman, director of the Nantz National Alzheimer Center at the Methodist Neurological Institute, addresses some common misconceptions about this devastating disease.
A new report from the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania tackles the ethical and logistical challenges of safely and effectively communicating a diagnosis of pre-clinical Alzheimer's disease in light of the gulf between diagnosis and treatment.
Cornell University researchers may have solved a 100-year puzzle: How to safely open and close the blood-brain barrier.
People with high cholesterol may have a higher risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease, according to a study published in the September 13, 2011, issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Any exercise that gets the heart pumping may reduce the risk of dementia and slow the condition’s progression once it starts, reported a Mayo Clinic study published this month in Mayo Clinic Proceedings. Researchers examined the role of aerobic exercise in preserving cognitive abilities and concluded that it should not be overlooked as an important therapy against dementia.
Many common signs of aging, such as shaking hands, stooped posture and walking slower, may be due to tiny blocked vessels in the brain that can’t be detected by current technology.
Nerve cells that regulate everything from heart muscle to salivary glands send out projections known as axons to their targets. By way of these axonal processes, neurons control target function and receive molecular signals from targets that return to the cell body to support cell survival. Now, Johns Hopkins researchers have revealed a molecular mechanism that allows a signal from the target to return to the cell body and fulfill its neuron-sustaining mission.
Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center offers Alzheimer's Disease expert.
A brain imaging scan identifies biochemical changes in the brains of normal people who might be at risk for Alzheimer’s disease, according to research published in the August 24, 2011, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Moderate social drinking significantly reduces the risk of dementia and cognitive impairment, according to an analysis of 143 studies by Loyola University Chicago Stritch School of Medicine researchers.
A new study suggests that the relationship between brain shrinkage and memory loss in Alzheimer’s disease changes across the age spectrum. The research is published in the August 10, 2011, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Older women who have sleep-related breathing problems may be at greater risk of problems with mental function, including dementia.
Scientists from Durin Technologies and the UMDNJ-School of Osteopathic Medicine have developed a blood test that detects specific antibodies in the blood that can be used to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease with unprecedented accuracy. The test has a sensitivity of 96 percent and a specificity of 92.5 percent.
Chimpanzees, the closest living relatives to humans, do not experience a decrease in brain volume as they age like humans do, according to a study by George Washington University researcher Chet Sherwood and his colleagues.
An existing anti-seizure drug improves memory and brain function in adults with a form of cognitive impairment that often leads to full-blown Alzheimer's disease, a Johns Hopkins University study has found.
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