A recent study conducted by researchers at Sweden’s Karolinska Institutet has found that levels of a protein called tau in the bloodstream can be associated with early detection and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease. The findings, which were published in the journal Alzheimer’s & Dementia, can bring us one step closer to identifying people at risk of developing the illness up to ten years before the development of noticeable symptoms.
The research team, led by doctoral student and affiliated researcher Robin Zhou, at Karolinska Institutet’s Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society (NVS) looked at the role of glycans, which are sugar molecules found in the blood, in dementia development. Their study demonstrated that blood levels of glycans were changed in early stages of Alzheimer’s disease. This suggests that the disease may be predicted with the help of a simple blood and memory test.
The researchers concentrated their analyses on 233 participants in the Swedish National Study on Aging and Care in Kungsholmen (SNAC-K). The participants were examined routinely for issues such as memory loss and dementia presence between 2001 and 2004. The follow-ups continued for 17 more years and the project’s findings showed that people with both high levels of tau and glycans had more than twice the risk of developing Alzheimer’s-type dementia than other individuals.
Apart from that, the authors of the study also proposed that a statistical model taking into account the levels of glycan structures in the blood, the risk gene APOE4, and the results of a memory test, can be used for predicting Alzheimer’s disease with an accuracy of eighty percent. This can be considered a groundbreaking discovery for the prognosis of Alzheimer’s which could potentially enable medical practitioners to intervene before too much damage has been done.
The Karolinska Institutet team is now further investigating the relationship between blood glycans and the onset of Alzheimer’s, and is also developing collaborations with researchers in primary care in Sweden, to evaluate different biomarkers for dementia in primary health care centres.
Indian startup PredOmix has also developed an AI-based blood test for accurate early cancer detection. This is yet another revolutionary form of testing which can result in accurate and earlier detection of cancer and potential preventive methods to deter its effects.
