Detect Alzheimer’s disease early with a blood test

Aside from a cure, which still seems a long way off, there is another “Holy Grail” of cancer research. Alzheimer’s disease This biomarker anticipate the first symptoms of this neurodegenerative disease causing 60% and 80% of dementia cases. The largest study to date, conducted by Spanish researchers, has identified a biomarker that will allow early detection of this disease using a simple blood test. This was achieved by a research team led by Alzheimer’s Center Ace in Barcelonain collaboration with Sant Pau Hospital from the same city. The study was published in the journal “Electronic medicine”from the Lancet group.

This biological snitch plasma biomarker pTau181a protein that has been known for 20 years to be involved in the degenerative process of Alzheimer’s disease. The study was conducted in a memory clinic with a very large sample of over 2000 patients and lasted 8 years. Biomarker pTau181 in blood It has a sensitivity of 94% and an accuracy of about 80%.

According to the Ace Alzheimer Center Barcelona, ​​to identify patients at high risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease in the early stages.

“Alzheimer’s disease is very difficult to detect in its early stagesbecause when the patient begins to show the first clinical symptoms, the changes that have occurred in the brain appeared 15 years earlier,” he explains. Amanda Canoresponsible for Molecular Biology and Biomarkers Program at the Ace Alzheimer’s Center in Barcelona and head of the research group. “Therefore,” he adds, “at this stage the patient does not have any sense of having a problem, and today we do not have any diagnostic or detection method that can solve this problem at these stages.”

Tau181 protein It serves to maintain the structure of neurons, but when changes occur in its structure, it stops functioning and tends to accumulate inside those nerve cells. “These aggregates cause a neurotoxic current.

which is typical for this disease, the researcher emphasizes. Detecting levels of this protein means we can understand or visualize the occurrence of this pathology,” he adds.

Dr. Cano, the study’s first author, notes that biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease are currently measured either by extracting cerebrospinal fluid using lumbar puncture – injection near the spinal cord, similar to an epidural – or through neuroimaging in which the patient is injected with a substance with a certain radioactive activity, and then an image of the brain lesion is obtained. “Both interventions, lumbar puncture and neuroimaging techniques, are invasive for the patient and very expensive for the healthcare system; by the day Today they are recommended only when the suspicion of the disease is very high.are not recommended in these initial stages,” he says. Using this biomarker could reduce the need for lumbar punctures by 39 percent.

clinical data they collected over 8 years, on over 2000 patients served as a comparison for this biomarker, which can be obtained non-invasively and is available in primary health care centers through a simple blood draw. This will speed up diagnosis at increasingly earlier stages, at which it is still possible to intervene and use new drugs such as Lekembi (lekanemab)which slows the progression of Alzheimer’s disease in the initial stages.