A new study published in Neuroscience 2023 hints of scientific pursuit into new methods that could help diagnose Alzheimer’s disease in its early stages. According the published article, proteins linked to mild brain impairment and Alzheimer’s Disease have been detected a blood-based test.
What is fascinating about the blood test?
Although the research abstract has not been published in a peer review journal, experts agree that this new method could be effective when it comes to early detection of the Alzheimer’s Disease. Per the paper, 18 proteins in blood that appears to be associated with changes linked to Alzheimer’s disease or mild cognitive impairment were identified.
This observation according to the scientists, prompted them to develop an 18-protein panel to identify Alzheimer’s disease or mild cognitive impairment. The developed panel was able to classify the two conditions in two different cohorts with more than 90% accuracy.
Along with helping with early diagnosis of the health condition, the authors of the paper also believe blood-based test can help detect biological pathways that may be involved in the development of Alzheimer’s disease.
Why is early detection of Alzheimer’s Disease Important?
Dr. Andrew Newberg, neuroscientist and director of research at the Marcus Institute of Integrative Health hints that “It will be more likely that at some point we can find a way to stop the progression of dementias such as AD rather than rebuild brain tissue that has already been destroyed by the disease process. So, the earlier we detect these neurodegenerative disorders, the more brain tissue we can protect and the less severe will be the cognitive impairment.”
Currently, the detection of Alzheimer’s disease processes is averagely slow. If we can detect the disease even before sufferers become symptomatic and lose any of their cognitive function, we can treat them and help them maintain their brain function at a relatively normal level.