Hope in Alzheimer's Treatment
Alzheimer’s disease is the fifth
leading cause of death in the US of people aged 65 years and older. Because of
this and the detrimental effects the disease has on sufferers and their
families, much research has been done to determine the cause of the disease and
to develop treatments. As many of you know Alzheimer’s is the most common form
of dementia, which is defined as the “general decline in mental ability severe
enough to interfere with daily life.” The thought of forgetting whom important
people in our lives are and losing the ability to live on our own and perform simple
daily tasks such as getting dressed is terrifying. But what if there were a way
to prevent this disease or a cure to stop its effects?
Michael Collins spoke at Loyola
University Chicago about research he and fellow researchers have done on how
moderate alcohol consumption could prevent the cognitive impairments and
progression of dementia. They looked at cultures of rat brains that had been
preconditioned with moderate levels of ethanol, the type of alcohol found in
alcoholic beverages. Their work pointed to a possible mechanism in which
ethanol can induce a neuroprotective state in the brain which blocks it from
the effects of neurotoxic proteins such as beta amyloid peptides. This mechanism
involves NMDA receptors, which leads to increases in the protein kinases PKC
and FAK. There is also increase in the enzyme Prx2, which has been linked to
neuroprotection from ischemia and is responsible for the protection from beta
amyloids.
These beta amyloid
peptides are thought to play an important role in the development of Alzheimer’s,
and many antibody drugs seek to act on these. As explained in the article, Antibody Drugs for Alzheimer's Show Glimmers of
Promise, many antibody drugs have failed in previous
tests, but recent trials of the drugs solanzumab and aducanumab developed by
Lilly and Biogen respectively provide possible hope for this approach.
Solanezumab was shown to slow cognitive decline by about 30% for people with
mild Alzheimer’s. While aducanumab did not have any statistically significant
clinical benefits at moderate doses, 27 people who received high doses of the
drug for one year showed significantly less cognitive decline than those who
received a placebo. While these results are positive findings there is still
controversy over whether amyloid deposits in the brain will be best treated
with these types of drugs. As Lon Shneider, an Alzheimer’s research pointed
out, behavioral interventions, such as changes is diet and exercise, have shown
to work just as well as drugs.This connects back to the
research done by Collins, suggesting that maybe a glass of wine at dinner every
night might be all we need to prevent Alzheimer’s.
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