Alzheimers

Back in 2009, I reported briefly on a large Norwegian study that found that older adults who consumed chocolate, wine, and tea performed significantly better on cognitive tests. The association was assumed to be linked to the flavanols in these products. A new study confirms this finding, and extends it to older adults with mild cognitive impairment.

Two years ago, I reported on a clinical trial of a nutrient cocktail called Souvenaid for those with early Alzheimer’s. The three-month trial, involving 225 patients, had some success in improving verbal recall, with those with the mildest level of impairment benefiting the most.

While the ‘Alzheimer’s gene’ is relatively common — the ApoE4 mutation is present in around 15% of the population — having two copies of the mutation is, thankfully, much rarer, at around 2%. Having two copies is of course a major risk factor for developing Alzheimer’s, and it has been thought that having a single copy is also a significant (though lesser) risk factor. Certainly there is quite a lot of evidence linking ApoE4 carriers to various markers of cognitive impairment.

Dementia is a progressive illness, and its behavioral and psychological symptoms are, for caregivers, the most difficult symptoms to manage. While recent research has demonstrated how collaborative care can reduce these symptoms and reduce stress for caregivers, the model requires continuous monitoring of the symptoms. What’s needed is a less arduous way of monitoring changes in symptoms.

Following on from mouse studies, a human study has investigated whether caffeine can help prevent older adults with mild cognitive impairment from progressing to dementia.

A study involving those with a strong genetic risk of developing Alzheimer’s has found that the first signs of the disease can be detected 25 years before symptoms are evident. Whether this is also true of those who develop the disease without having such a strong genetic predisposition is not yet known.

The study involved 128 individuals with a 50% chance of inheriting one of three mutations that are certain to cause Alzheimer’s, often at an unusually young age. On the basis of participants’ parents’ medical history, an estimate of age of onset was calculated.

A new study, involving 1,219 dementia-free older adults (65+), has found that the more omega-3 fatty acids the person consumed, the lower the level of beta-amyloid in the blood (a proxy for brain levels). Consuming a gram of omega-3 more than the average per day was associated with 20-30% lower beta-amyloid levels. A gram of omega-3 equates to around half a fillet of salmon per week.

Here’s a different aspect to cognitive reserve. I have earlier reported on the first tranche of results from this study. Now new results, involving 246 older adults from the Rush Memory and Aging Project, have confirmed earlier findings that having a greater purpose in life may help protect against the brain damage wrought by Alzheimer’s disease.

Interpreting brain activity is a very tricky business. Even the most basic difference can be interpreted in two ways — i.e., what does it mean if a region is more active in one group of people compared to another? A new study not only indicates a new therapeutic approach to amnestic mild cognitive impairment, but also demonstrates the folly of assuming that greater activity is good.

Genetic analysis of 9,232 older adults (average age 67; range 56-84) has implicated four genes in how fast your hippocampus shrinks with age (rs7294919 at 12q24, rs17178006 at 12q14, rs6741949 at 2q24, rs7852872 at 9p33). The first of these (implicated in cell death) showed a particularly strong link to a reduced hippocampus volume — with average consequence being a hippocampus of the same size as that of a person 4-5 years older.