Alzheimer's, Dementia & Mental Health
Science Finding Alzheimer’s Hard to Treat; Best
Strategy May Be Prevention
Institute on Aging clinical trial seeks volunteers
to help find the disease at very beginning in senior citizens
Amsterdam, June 14, 2010 – Finding a cure for
Alzheimer’s disease, or an effective treatment, has been difficult for
the world’s best researchers. There is substantial progress in finding
ways to delay or prevent the disease by identifying AD risk factors and
developing targeted treatments, according to a special issue of the
Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.
This month, too, a study funded by the National
Institutes of Health, sent out a notice seeing volunteers for a clinical
study examining the subtle changes that may take place in the brains of
older people many years before overt symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease
appear.
Researchers are looking for people with the very
earliest complaints of memory problems that affect their daily
activities. The study will follow participants over time, using imaging
techniques developed to advance research into changes taking place in
the structure and function of the living brain, as well as biomarker
measures found in blood and cerebrospinal fluid. (see more about this
clinical trial and 24 locations involved below news report.)
In the special publication, "Basics of Alzheimer's
Disease Prevention," researchers report on key findings that point
towards possible significant interventions to slow or stop AD
development .
The significance of the special is that it provides
for the first time, a strategic blueprint using the 4 pillars of
preventive medicine, according to the publisher.
These pillars are:
1. Identification of disease-related and
lifestyle risk factors;
2. Pathologic consequences and impact of AD
risk; factors
3. Detection of AD risk factors;
4. Treatment of AD risk factors.
A collection of 24 articles that address these four
pillars of AD prevention were assembled by guest editor Jack C. de la
Torre, MD, PhD, from the Center for Alzheimer's Research, Banner Sun
Health Research Institute, Sun City, Arizona.
"Just as the harmful consequences of cervical
cancer, pancreatitis, severe anemia, and acute renal failure can be
generally improved through routine lab test detection and administration
of appropriate therapy, so too can preclinical AD become responsive to
early detection of risk factors and targeted treatments aimed at
reducing the severity and progress of the discovered pathology,”
according to Dr. de la Torre,.
“Unlike the potentially lethal disorders stated
above, people with AD have no effective treatment options—prevention
thus becomes the alternate and essential primary weapon to combat this
disease."
The strategies proposed offer a realistic hope to
the millions of people who face a range of maladies associated with
aging and cognitive decline - including multiple risk factors that can
culminate in dementia.
This approach of knowledge-to-action using
evidence-based medical decisions to opt for the most judicious
treatments or management of patients when risk factors to AD are
discovered, as reviewed in this issue, should become a gold standard of
clinical practice.
Collectively, the contributing authors advocate an
AD preventive plan that would incorporate:
1. Early identification/detection of AD risk
factors;
2. Early intervention based on evidence-based
medical decisions;
3. Patient follow-up to assess and modify when
necessary, strategic intervention.
“The information contained in this Special Issue
will be fundamental to recognizing, managing and reducing the major risk
factors for AD, a process which should take the sting out of the growing
prevalence of this dementia in years to come,” according to a news
release from the publisher.
“The articles will be of interest to anyone
involved in the care, management or treatment of AD and to those who
wish to learn more about this form of dementia.”
George Perry, PhD and and Mark A. Smith, PhD,
Editors-in-Chief of the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, added, "Moving
AD from inevitable to avoidable is what we are all hoping for as we
understand the disease," commented.
NIH-Supported Study Looks for Earliest Changes in
the Brain That May Lead to Alzheimer’s Disease
Researchers seek to recruit 200 volunteers between
the ages of 55 and 90 who may be transitioning from normal cognitive
aging to an early stage of amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI), a
condition that may progress to Alzheimer’s disease.
Participants may volunteer at 51 sites across the
United States.
The National Institute on Aging (NIA), part of the
National Institutes of Health, and the NIH Office of the Director are
funding the $24 million, two-year Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging
Initiative Grand Opportunity (ADNI-GO) study.
“ADNI-GO is part of an ongoing effort to establish
imaging and fluid biomarker measures of Alzheimer’s disease from the
onset of mild symptoms to the advanced stages of the disease process,”
said NIA Director Richard J. Hodes, M.D. “By advancing understanding of
the full spectrum of the disease, we’ll be better able to identify who
is at risk, track progression of the disorder, and devise measurements
to test the effectiveness of potential prevention or treatment
strategies.”
The grant expands the efforts of the Alzheimer’s
Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI), a research partnership supported
primarily by the NIA with private-sector support through the Foundation
for the National Institutes of Health ADNI began in 2004 to establish
neuroimaging and biomarker measures to track the changes taking place in
the brains of 800 older people either free of symptoms or diagnosed with
late-stage MCI and early Alzheimer’s disease. ADNI is led by the
Northern California Institute for Research and Education, a nonprofit
foundation affiliated with the San Francisco VA Medical Center. Michael
Weiner, M.D., is the principal investigator.
The new ADNI-GO effort enables researchers to
continue studying nearly 500 of the original ADNI volunteers, while
expanding the study to include the new participants with early amnestic
MCI. Newly enrolled participants and some original study volunteers will
undergo a lumbar puncture to collect cerebrospinal fluids.
“The objective of ADNI-GO is to add to the power of
the original study by increasing our knowledge of the sequence and
timing of events involved in the disease from its earliest measureable
point, perhaps even pre-symptomatically, to overt Alzheimer’s disease,”
said Marcelle Morrison-Bogorad, Ph.D., director of NIA’s Division of
Neuroscience.
The ability to gain this knowledge is only
possible, Morrison-Bogorad emphasized, through the generosity of
research volunteers. “The research community is deeply grateful to the
volunteers, and their families and friends, who give of themselves in
this search for a cure for or prevention of Alzheimer’s disease,” she
said.
To volunteer or learn more about the study, contact
the NIA Alzheimer’s Disease Education and Referral Center by calling
1-800-438-4380 or by going to
www.nia.nih.gov/Alzheimers. Volunteers must speak English or Spanish
and have a person willing to assist them during at least five clinic
visits and with telephone contacts from researchers.
Data from the study will be posted to a publicly
accessible database available to qualified researchers worldwide. To
date, more than 800 researchers have signed up for ADNI database access.
Investigators may apply for access through the database Web site at
www.loni.ucla.edu/ADNI. In addition, qualified scientists may also
ask for access to the cerebrospinal fluid and blood samples.
In addition to NIA, the original ADNI study
involved other federal partners: the National Institute of Biomedical
Imaging and Bioengineering, also part of NIH, and the U.S. Food and Drug
Administration, another agency of the U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services. To learn more about ADNI advances and the private-public
partnership supporting the research, go to
www.nia.nih.gov/NewsAndEvents/PressReleases/PR20090317biomarker.htm.
The NIA leads the federal government effort
conducting and supporting research on the biomedical, social and
behavioral issues of older people. For more information on aging-related
research and the NIA, go to
www.nia.nih.gov. The NIA provides information on age-related
cognitive change and neurodegenerative disease specifically at its
Alzheimer’s Disease Education and Referral (ADEAR) Center site at
www.nia.nih.gov/Alzheimers. To sign up for e-mail alerts about new
findings or publications, please visit either website.
FNIH was established by the United States Congress
to support the mission of the National Institutes of Health—improving
health through scientific discovery. The foundation identifies and
develops opportunities for innovative public-private partnerships
involving industry, academia and the philanthropic community. A
non-profit, 501(c)(3) corporation, the foundation raises private-sector
funds for a broad portfolio of unique programs that complement and
enhance NIH priorities and activities. The foundation's Web site address
is
www.fnih.org.
The NIH—The Nation’s Medical Research
Agency—includes 27 institutes and centers and is a component of the U.
S. Department of Health and Human Services. It is the primary federal
agency for conducting and supporting basic, clinical and translational
medical research, and it investigates the causes, treatments and cures
for both common and rare diseases. For more information about NIH and
its programs, visit
www.nih.gov.
The 51 study sites recruiting volunteers are
located in:
Albany, N.Y.
Amherst, N.Y.
Ann Arbor, Mich.
Atlanta
Baltimore
Birmingham, Ala.
Boston
Charleston, S.C.
Chicago
Cleveland
Dallas
Durham, N.C.
Hartford, Conn.
Houston
Indianapolis
Irvine, Calif.
Jacksonville, Fla.
Kansas City, Kan.
Las Vegas
Lebanon, N.H.
Lexington, Ky.
Los Angeles
Madison, Wis.
Miami
New Haven, Conn
New York City
Palo Alto, Calif.
Philadelphia
Phoenix
Pittsburgh
Portland, Ore.
Providence, R.I.
Rochester, Minn.
Rochester, N.Y.
Sacramento, Calif.
San Diego
San Francisco
St. Louis
Sun City, Ariz.
Washington
West Palm Beach, Fla.
Winston-Salem, N.C.
