Blood Test May Detect Alzheimers Disease Long Before Symptom

A new blood test is being developed which detects two types of proteins only present in people with Alzheimer's disease, say scientists from the Institute of Psychiatry at King's College London, UK. The test can identify Alzheimer's disease long before the patient starts having the symptoms - before he/she even knows he/she has got Alzheimer's.

You can read about this new research in the journal Brain.

When the development of this blood test is complete, people should be diagnosed much earlier. This means treatment could start much earlier as well.

In this study the scientists compared the blood of 500 people with Alzheimer's disease with the blood of 500 healthy elderly people. They found that people with Alzheimer's disease have higher levels of two types of proteins in their blood, compared to the blood of people without Alzheimer's. The two proteins are complement factor H (CFH) precursor and a-2-macroglobulin (a-2M).
(In the protein symbol, the character 'a' means 'alpha'. The proper symbol was not placed because some browsers pick them up as question marks)

Study leader, Professor Simon Lovestone, said "This is definitely good news. We found some evidence that there are protein differences in the blood of people with Alzheimer's. This raises the prospect of a blood test for Alzheimer's disease."

About 1 in every 60 to 70 people have Alzheimer's disease. About 750,000 to 1 million in either the UK, France, Italy or Germany, and 4 to 5 million in the USA. The risk of having Alzheimer's disease grows the older you get - as many as 50% of people over 85 may have Alzheimer's/Dementia.

The study is being funded by the Alzheimer's Research Trust, UK.

"Proteome-based plasma biomarkers for Alzheimer's disease"
A. Hye, S. Lynham, M. Thambisetty, M. Causevic, J. Campbell, H. L. Byers, C. Hooper, F. Rijsdijk, S. J. Tabrizi, S. Banner, C. E. Shaw, C. Foy, M. Poppe, N. Archer, G. Hamilton, J. Powell, R. G. Brown, P. Sham, M. Ward and S. Lovestone
Brain 2006 129(11):3042-3050; doi:10.1093/brain/awl279
Click here to see abstract online

Written by: Christian Nordqvist
Editor: Medical News Today
(责任编辑：泉水)

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Blood Test May Detect Alzheimers Disease Long Before Symptom