Last summertime , a promising test of a new antibody discussion was shown to totally stop cognitive decline in four Alzheimer ’s patients over the class of three years , give researchers hope that the disease could be slow down or even cured . This year , it was expanded into a double blind placebo test and administered to nigh 100 times more Alzheimer ’s affected role . It proved ineffective . Goddammit .
The failed subject wasannounced yesterdayby Baxter , and did not show any difference between placebo patient role and those give the drug . It followstwo otherstudies — and huge disappointment — from last year that tried and fail to assail amyloid protein ( amyloid plaques and tau protein both need to be present in the encephalon for a positivistic diagnosing ) .
An estimated 5.1 million Americans have Alzheimer’s—35 million worldwide — and it ’s the sixth leading cause of death in the res publica . Of naturally , we do n’t reverence Alzheimer ’s as a in particular cruel disease because of its death count , but because of its tragic effect on the livelihood . It ’s possibly the most heartrending affliction we have . combat-ready Alzheimer ’s character areonly expected to rise with the age population , as the endangerment of Alzheimer ’s duplicate every five years after the historic period of 65 , and the US ’s 65 - and - old universe will itself double to 88.5 million between 2010 and 2050 . We require to figure something out , soon .
Despite the late unsatisfying results , there are some other hopeful studies out there , too . Simplygetting enough sleepmight reap benefits down the road , or adopt apill to chemically enlargen a part of your brainthat shrink in patients with dementia or clinical depression could aid . cardiac pacemaker - alike implantshave even been depend at , and are foretell . But we still do n’t cognise what ’s going wrongly in these studies .
https://gizmodo.com/sleeping-better-now-helps-prevent-memory-loss-when-your-5885316
It might be that scientist need to look elsewhere , off from just amyloid protein . Maybe tau , which isinstrumental in the cognitive mess made of NFL players ’ brains , will be looked at more closely soon . possibly a type of blocking factor for both , or something else . It ’s voiceless to say , because all we ’re looking at for now is a bunch of failed attempts , on patient role who might even be too far along with the disease to help . By the time symptoms begin to show , the disease could be more aggressive and harder to moderate . We just do n’t cognise .
There are some promising advance in diagnosing the disease — theUCLA - rise FDDNP[18 ] PET scan markerthat attaches to both tau and amyloid , for example — but they are still prohibitively expensive for anyone not experience any symptoms . There are other type of tests for brain disease , like computerized cognitive testing , but all require symptom to begin to manifest , which may be too late .
https://deadspin.com/can-science-see-inside-an-nfl-players-skull-before-its-5920006
Look , this is just how science works , and “ adjudicate harder , jerk ” is the least helpful of the many sentiments that make out up in discussions about for - now incurable disease . Science try something , and it did n’t work . That ’s OK . before long , it will try something else , and that might succeed where everything else has not , or it could be that it wo n’t . It wo n’t hold on render ; Sisyphus will get that goddamn bowlder on top of that pitcher’s mound . But for now , we ’re rolling powerful back to where we started , and that ’s terribly disappointing . It ’s OK to just say that this suck . [ Technology Review ]
Image : Shutterstock / Andrii Muzyka
Alzheimer ’s diseaseScience
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