Health
New Tool Predicts Alzheimer’s Progression for Next 5 Years
United States: Scientists have been able to demystify the prognosis of Alzheimer’s disease, which has caused both patients and carers to be worried about the uncertainty of the future developments of the disease in the patient.
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According to the experts, they have made a tool that could predict the forthcoming five years of cognitive decline for patients who are with early signs of Alzheimer’s.
As the researchers note, the course of dementia happens to be different among different persons, but the researchers produce a predictive model, on the basis of a thorough study of patients, as sciencealert.com reported.
According to the physician-researcher Pieter van der Veere of Amsterdam University in the Netherlands, “People are very interested in what to expect from the disease in themselves or their loved ones, so better prediction models are urgently needed,” as sciencealert.com reported.
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The study was conducted by Van der Veere and his colleagues, who examined about 961 colleagues, whose average age lay around 65.
Out of them, 651 had mild dementia, and the rest were with mild cognitive impairment.
As the researchers observed, every patient had also formed amyloid beta plaques, protein deposits in their brain, which is common in Alzheimer’s patients and is said to be the most common form of dementia.
To get the results, they skillfully examined MRI scans and biomarkers collected from cerebrospinal fluid.
They also considered each patient’s age and gender, medical history, and cognitive test scores over time, marked out of 30.
Those who scored above 25 were assigned as no dementia person, those with 21 to 24 were declared to have mild dementia, 10 to 20 were moderate, and anyone below ten was said to have a severe form of dementia.
The test scores helped to determine that those with mild cognitive impairment (score 26.4 on average) had the score declined to 21 in the past five years, sciencealert.com reported.
However, in patients with mild dementia, the test scores dropped from 22.4 to 7.8 in five years, the fastest progression noticed.
Moreover, the scientists were also able to determine and make a model of the effects of medication.
According to neuroscientist Wiesje van der Flier of Amsterdam University, “In the future, this will become even more important if we can treat Alzheimer’s disease,”
He added, “This can be a starting point for conversations between doctor, patient, and family about the pros and cons of treatments so that they can come to an appropriate decision together,” as sciencealert.com reported.