Especially since the cognitive disorders caused by MS can be confused with the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease and biological analyzes and imaging examinations are then necessary to differentiate the diseases. However, the St. Louis team reveals that MS patients are much less likely to have molecular features of Alzheimer’s disease.
This discovery suggests a new avenue for research into treatments for Alzheimer’s disease, concludes one of the lead authors, Dr. Matthew Brier, professor of neurology and radiology: “A hallmark of the biology of multiple sclerosis, or the genetics of MS patients protect against Alzheimer’s. If we can identify what this protective aspect is and reproduce it in a controlled way, we will be able to obtain a therapy against Alzheimer’s disease.
The research was initially motivated by the authors’ observations in clinical practice during the treatment of their MS patients. Although these patients lived long enough to develop Alzheimer’s disease or even if some of them had a family history, they did not develop the disease or much less often.
Another author, Dr Anne Cross says:
“I noticed that none of my MS patients suffered from typical Alzheimer’s disease,
and, in case of cognitive problems, I sent them to the memory and aging specialists for an evaluation and this evaluation always ruled out the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease.
A factor in the very nature of MS protects against Alzheimer’s
The study uses a new blood test approved by the US FDA, known as PrecivityAD2, and very effective in predicting the presence of amyloid plaques in the brain, in 100 MS patients, 11 of whom also underwent emission tomography positrons (PET). The results of these participants with MS were compared to those of a control group of 300 people without MS matched for age, genetic risk of Alzheimer’s disease and cognitive decline. This analysis reveals that:
- 50% of patients with MS in less have amyloid pathology vs controls, according to the blood test;
- Alzheimer’s disease appears less likely to develop in people with MS;
- the more typical the patient’s MS history, in terms of age of onset, severity and overall disease progression, the lower the risk of amyloid plaque accumulation in the brain;
- Taken together, these observations suggest that there is a factor, in the very nature of MS, which protects against Alzheimer’s disease. On a more mechanical level, MS patients generally experience several relapses of the disease over the course of their lives. During these flare-ups, the immune system attacks the central nervous system, including in the brain. It is possible that this immune activity also reduces amyloid plaques.
Research continues, with the aim of unravel the possible human genetic characteristics involvedwith tests also, making it possible to decipher the slightest development of amyloid plaques in animal models of MS and the hope of treatments…
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