Scientists developing a blood test for early detection of Alzheimer’s disease have found a link between a sugar molecule in the bloodstream and abnormal protein deposits that cause the disease 10 years before symptoms appear.
Alzheimer’s disease is a disease characterized by abnormal accumulation of amyloid beta and tau proteins that kill neurons in the brain. These proteins cluster in the brain and cause symptoms such as memory loss, cognitive impairment, and behavioral changes. There is no definitive treatment for Alzheimer’s disease and its effects are irreversible.
That’s why it’s so important to detect Alzheimer’s disease as early as possible. Early detection helps patients and their caregivers prepare for the disease, evaluate treatment options, and to improve quality of life might help. However, Alzheimer’s disease there was no reliable and easy method for early diagnosis, at least until now. Often complex and expensive methods were required, such as brain scans, cognitive tests, and spinal fluid samples.
This simple blood test can detect Alzheimer’s disease 10 years earlier
Researchers from the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden have linked a sugar molecule in the bloodstream with Alzheimer’s disease. This molecule is a glucan molecule called bisected N-acetylglucosamine. Glucans are structures made up of sugar molecules, they are located on the surface of proteins and affect their functions.
Researchers analyzed data from 233 people as part of the Swedish National Survey on Aging and Care (SNAC-K). The original data were collected between 2001 and 2004 and at intervals determined according to the age of the participants. followed for 17 years. People with matching glucan and tau levels in their blood were more than twice as likely to develop Alzheimer’s dementia.
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This link has been seen before in the cerebrospinal fluid in the spinal cord, but blood tests are much easier to do. If these findings turn into an Alzheimer’s screening test, the researchers would like to add further criteria. For example, it is associated with an increased risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease. It’s like looking at the APOE4 gene.
In addition, a simple statistical model that takes into account blood glycan and tau levels, the risk gene APOE4, and a memory test suggests that Alzheimer’s disease almost a decade before symptoms such as memory loss appear. It proves that it can be used to predict disease with 80% confidence. this invention.