Alzheimer’s Disease presently claims over 4 million souls in the United States. In the next generation that number is expected to quadruple. One of the heart wrenching facts about Alzheimer’s is that there is a quagmire of obstacles for diagnosing this disease early; from the patient’s denial, to complicated and expensive diagnostic tools. Delaying diagnosis may well mean that the patient’s ability to sustain any type of quality to the life which is left them has been eliminated. Drugs which can slow the process, are no longer effective.
Therefore, the bells were sounded when researchers at Stanford discovered that Alzheimer’s could be diagnosed by a simple blood test. Not only did this blood test have 90% accuracy with those who had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s; but it also predicted patient’s who would progress to Alzheimer’s 2 to 6 years later.
Although more extensive testing is required prior to making this test for public use; it is one of the most hopeful interventions which have surfaced for this catastrophic disease.
Sandip, R. et al.: “Classification and prediction of clinical Alzheimer's diagnosis based on plasma signaling proteins”, Nature Medicine, October
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