Alzheimer’s

Ahead of Alzheimer’s is vital when it comes to stopping its advance. Some of the most important clues are in language

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Alzheimer’s is one of several disorders causing dementia in the third age. It is also the most frequent: in Spain it is estimated that in 2019 there were about 800,000 people suffer from the disease, according to data Spanish Society of Neurology. Globally Estimates They suggest that more than 30 million people live with it. One of the challenges with which patients, family and health professionals have to face is Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Of a Early diagnosis It depends a lot on our reaction capacity to face the symptoms of this disease for now incurable. We have advanced a lot in the diagnosis of this disorder. So much that one of Our main tools Diagnosis is discard, that is, rule out that cognitive deterioration detected in one person is caused by other forms of dementia, such as Parkinson’s. Fortunately, it is not the only tool at our disposal. Another diagnosis pillar are capacities. Specialists can resort to evidence that allows them Evaluate our cognitive abilities And our memory. In this context, interviews can also be conducted to the relatives who help evaluate the patient. The images by scanner, both magnetic resonances, as computerized tomographies or by positron emission, can also give clues. On the one hand they can help in the work of discarding other pathologies, but also They can help To detect the presence of amyloid plates linked to the disease. Until relatively a short time, the confirmation of Alzheimer’s diagnosis could only be done after the patient’s death, examining his brain. Conremps diagnostic techniques can already offer us a comparable degree of certainty. Partly thanks to the last of the tools available to experts, biomarkers. Collecting clues The diagnosis of this disease can only be performed by experts in the field, but sometimes it is important to be attentive to the clues They tell us that in family or relative may be developing the disease. Tracks that can notify us that the time has come to request help from health professionals. In a Recent article in The conversationSarah Curtis, a language expert at Nottingham Trent, listed some perceptible clues through Speech changes of the people who are developing this disease. The first of these indications is the appearance of pauses and doubts in speech, accompanied by a certain vagueness when expressing. That is, the person may have difficulty finding the word you want to use and just trying to overcome this obstacle by resorting to trunk words as “thing” or describing the object vaguely. Another early indication of Alzheimer’s is in confusion when using words. These confusion can be almost imperceptible at the beginning since they can start with words that allude to more general categories, such as using “animal” instead of “dog.” They are more noticeable if the substitution is for another concept in the semantic field, such as using “cat”. Another track listed by Curtis It is the passage of facts to words. People with Alzheimer may have difficulties when completing certain activities, which will result in this person talking about the activity, the emotions that arouses them or even expressing doubts or longing regarding their ability to complete the action. Memory loss can be primed with the lexical variety of the person suffering from Alzheimer’s. That is why this disease can begin by manifesting with An increasingly reduced vocabulary and a greater tendency to repeat words. The fifth and last of the indications mentioned by Curtis on his list, has to do with precision when choosing the words. A person who develops Alzheimer’s can have difficulty listing diverse words in the same category, such as different animals, food or words that begin with a specific letter. This is why the tests used in their diagnosis often ask people who perform this type of enumerations. Many people can read some of these indications and think “this happens to me too.” And it is that confusion of this type are normal. It is common for us to be tongue in countless contexts. That is why it is important to attend to changes in speech and not simply to the existence of confusion or difficulties. Alzheimer’s is a disease that does not appear out of nowhere but is gradually aggravated and is generally not detectable in its early stages. That is why it is often of vital importance attend to your first symptoms. Even more if we consider that some of the treatments are only effective delaying the disease in these early stages. In Xataka | We have a new “theory of all” to understand Alzheimer’s. Your key is in small granules Image | Jiun-Je Lin

The new hope against Alzheimer’s is a simple protein. We have discovered it thanks to a tiny worm

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Many of the processes that happen in our body depend on proteins. All if we take into account the processes that do it indirectly. Sometimes proteins fail. Then, the function of cleaning these “defective” proteins falls, yes, on other proteins. MANF. A new study He has revealed The importance of MANF protein (Mesencephalic Astrocyte-Derned Neurotrophic Factor) For our aging or, to be more precise, when avoiding some of the problems that arise at the cellular level and that we usually associate with age. Doing cleaning. In principle, that a cell badly codifies a protein does not have to generate major problems in our body. Cell homeostasis, the process that discards proteins after use, is a cellular “maintenance” process that deals with this type of problem. However, with age our cells lose efficacy when keeping the house in order. “Defective” proteins can end up accumulating and generating protein clots. This is What we believe occurs with diseases such as Parkinson or Alzheimer’s. When the cell detects these problems, it can stop synthesizing new proteins until the problem is solved. If it does not, the cell dies. Cleaning work. The new study has observed that MANF protein It plays an important role in this cleaning process inside the cell. His work consists in breaking protein clusters to facilitate the expulsion of these and thus maintaining our healthy cells. The team observed that this protein also served to “activate” the intracellular cleaning system. C. Elegans. In his work, the team turned to a unique worm, the Caenorhabditis Elegansa usual microscopic size nematode in laboratories around the world. The team altered the genetics of these worms to increase the presence of the MANF protein in their cells. The worms C. Elegans They are transparent, which facilitates the work of researchers when visualizing the changes that induce their genes. The team managed to see the effects of MANF on cells and tissues. Protein, They pointwas present in the lysosomas (some cell organelles linked to longevity and protein aggregation). In this way they could appreciate how the protein broke cell clusters and activated the cleaning system. The details of the experiment were published In an article In the magazine Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Beyond worms. What is true for the biology of a small worm does not have to be in that of humans, but the team points out that this would be a universal process, at least in animal cells since Manf is a common protein to all species of this kingdom. The fight against Alzheimer’s. The big issue is now how to transform this new knowledge into therapies to fight some of the diseases that we associate with aging, such as Alzheimer’s, or against aging itself. Alzheimer is an important since the dominant hypothesis to explain this disease part precisely of the appearance of intracellular clusters such as those that fight the Manf protein. As explained by those responsible for the new study, transforming this protein into a treatment will require better understanding its role in our body and other possible interactions between it and cellular functions beyond cell homeostasis. In Xataka | We have been listening to the benefits of Omega-3 for years. Now we know that it also rejuvenates us Image | McMaster University

We have a new “theory of all” to understand Alzheimer’s. Your key is in small granules

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Creating “theories of all”, unified models that explain various phenomena associated with a scientific field, is not exclusive heritage of physicists. The fight against some diseases can also benefit from models that help us understand their causes and consequences and the processes that mediate. New model. Now a group of researchers has devised a new modela theory that tries to explain Alzheimer’s disease through a “unified explanation of molecular chaos” that derives in this neurodegenerative disorder. According to this new theory, the disease and its symptoms would derive from a collapse of the transport system in charge of moving molecules between the nucleus and cell cytoplasm. This new theory can help simplify a topic as complex as Alzheimer’s. However, its authors remember that this disruption is still extremely complex, with more than a thousand genes involved in it. “Our proposal, focused on the rupture of communication between the nucleus and the cytoplasm leading to massive disruptions in gene expression, offers a plausible framework to understand the mechanisms that lead to this complex disease,” Explain in a press release Paul Coleman, co -author of the new model. A granular problem The model places the formation of chronic stress granules at the beginning of this process. These are clusters of proteins and RNA chains responsible for generating stress in the cell. Stress granules are usually generated temporarily. Its original function is to respond to cell stress by leaving some processes until the cell can recover. Once its duty has fulfilled and the stress disappeared, they dissolve. The problem unleashes when these granules become chronic, which leads them to catch other molecules, making it difficult for them to move between the nucleus and the rest of the cell. From inside out. The model starts from this trigger to explain with it the disease and its consequences outside the cellular unit. And it is that the changes that occur at the cellular level end up affecting cerebral synapses, metabolism, protein processing and cell survival, as explained by the model responsible for the model. The details of the new model were published In an article In the magazine Alzheimer’s and Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association. A disease with many faces. Alzheimer is one of the most intriguing diseases, Explain the responsible team of the new model. In part, they point out, this is because it takes the appearance of various diseases made one, with symptoms that include memory loss and cognitive deterioration, but also changes in personality and in our same internal biology. This complexity, continues to expose the team, is partly responsible for how extremely difficult it is to study this disease. Models like this that schematize their processes, can serve future researchers to find new routes of action that become more effective therapies when facing the symptoms of Alzheimer’s or, even, the same disease. In Xataka | In his tireless fight against Alzheimer’s, scientists have encountered an unexpected ally: coffee Image | Jason DREES/AS

The atlas of side effects (positive and negative) of Ozempic discovered | Health and well-being

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All medications have side effects, just take a look at any leaflet to see this. But there are not many cases in which these amount to the main effect. This is what happened a few years ago with GLP-1 agonists, medications used for decades to treat type 2 diabetes that began to demonstrate weight-loss effects. After several reformulations, new commercial brands, such as Ozempic and Wegovy, became an effective way to end obesity. But science is proving that there are many other side effects that could become major ones. GLP-1 is a molecular Swiss army knife, a kind of all-purpose drug. They affect our bodies in ways we still don’t fully understand. But today we are closer to listing. A team of scientists from the University of Washington School of Medicine has published the first detailed atlas of the side effects of these drugs. They have found benefits for cognitive and behavioral health, while revealing an increased risk of developing pancreatitis and kidney conditions. “Until now we had seen anecdotes and reports here and there. “Some people saying that it can affect this or that,” explained its main author, the clinical epidemiologist, in the presentation of the study. Ziyad Al-Aly, from the John J. Cochran Veterans Hospital. “But no one, no one had thoroughly investigated the effectiveness and risks of GLP-1 and all the ways it can affect health.” The study was published this Monday in the journal Nature Medicineshowcase of the best world science. More information “We did an analysis that comprehensively mapped the associations between GLP-1 and 175 potential health effects,” Al-Aly notes. The benefits, beyond weight loss, included a lower risk of substance use disorders and a reduction in suicidal ideation, schizophrenia, and other psychotic disorders. They also observed a reduction in cognitive disorders, such as Alzheimer’s and dementia. And finally, a reduction in the risk of clotting disorders, including stroke. “We found that these drugs have a wide range of beneficial effects, but all this does not come without risks,” warns the expert. The study confirms that, in some cases, they can cause gastrointestinal problems, such as nausea and vomiting. This is quite common and has already been documented in some patients. An increased risk of gastroparesis or stomach paralysis in rare cases and an increased risk of low blood pressure have also been seen. The analysis also notes that the drug may increase the risk of sleep problems and headaches, kidney stones, and drug-induced kidney inflammation. For these reasons, the authors recommend that, when evaluating this treatment, it should always be done under medical supervision and after an individualized analysis. “It is an observational study, although it has a large database and has been carried out for a long time,” he explains. Christopher Moralesan endocrinologist at the Virgen Macarena University Hospital in Seville, who was not involved in the study. The study does not demonstrate, therefore, that the medication is the cause of the listed effects. But these are consistent enough (risk reduction between 10 and 20%) and the database large enough (almost two million patients over three years) to think there is a direct relationship. “With Big Data you can scrape these results in very large databases and this is positive. But we must remember that here we can only verify association, not causality.” The objective of this research, in the words of its own authors, was not to analyze a specific effect and demonstrate causality, but to build an atlas of the association of risks and benefits of this relatively new medicine. “It’s like when Christopher Columbus arrived in America, and he thought about mapping it to get his bearings,” explains Al-Aly. “This is what we are doing, drawing a landscape of benefits and risks.” This opens the door to the possibility that in the future, after many reformulations and research, we can talk about an Ozempic for dementia, alcoholism or Alzheimer’s. There is still a long way to go, but this study has drawn a first map to locate the path. And there are many companies willing to embark on this adventure. There is currently a scientific and commercial race to find the next revolutionary use of GLP-1 agonists. Everyone has in mind the case of Novo Nordisk, the Danish laboratory that presented Ozempic in 2018, and which today has a stock market capitalization of 382,000 million dollars, which makes it the largest company in Europe. This has enormous business and economic implications, but from the scientific world, the question is different. How does an anti-diabetes drug have so many and varied effects? “Medicines don’t work surgically. They are designed to do one thing, but the reality is that this is almost never the case,” reflects Al-Aly. “Biology is complex and multiple, and if you touch one thing you will create a network of various effects.” GLP-1 acts on the intestine, but also on the brain, affecting areas that are involved in impulse control and reward signaling. This would explain why they help mitigate addiction problems. These medications would also affect the blood vessels, and in doing so have a potential effect on the heart. There is research that suggests that they also reduce inflammation, including that of the brain, which could explain their protective effect against neurodegenerative diseases. “But there is also another simpler theory that can explain all these positive health effects,” explains Al-Aly. Obesity is considered a disease in itself, but also the gateway to many others. It is the fifth risk factor for death in the world and every year 2.8 million adults die as a result of this condition. “When we treat obesity, it is normal that this affects other diseases, since it is the mother of them all,” summarizes Al-Aly. The expert has not yet decided, with the available scientific evidence, on which of these two theories has more force. The first would mean that we are talking about a miracle drug with multiple uses. The second would be less profitable for companies, would fill … Read more

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