One study suggests that a simple brain scan can detect people with early-stage Alzheimer’s disease.
In what could be a breakthrough, researchers have developed an algorithm that can diagnose the disease with an accuracy of up to 98%.
The software uses standard MRI technology found in most hospitals to produce a result in 12 hours.
It can currently take months to diagnose the disease in the NHS and requires a series of memory and cognitive tests as well as scans.
Researchers at Imperial College London who developed the algorithm, which was tested on more than 400 people, expect it to be deployed to the NHS in 2025.
The technology works by looking for abnormalities in 115 regions of the brain, analyzing features such as size, shape, and texture. It could help experts find out exactly what causes the condition of memory theft.
It has previously been used to scan tumors of women with ovarian cancer to judge how likely the cancer is to progress.
Scientists have developed an algorithm that can diagnose the disease with an accuracy of up to 98%. It uses the standard MRI technology found in most hospitals and produces a result in 12 hours (stock image)
It can currently take months to diagnose the disease in the NHS and requires a series of memory and cognitive tests as well as scans (stock)
What is Alzheimer’s?
Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive and degenerative disease of the brain, in which the accumulation of abnormal proteins causes nerve cells to die.
This alters the transmitters that carry messages and causes the brain to shrink.
More than 5 million people suffer from the disease in the United States, where it is the sixth leading cause of death, and more than 1 million Britons have it.
WHAT’S GOING ON?
When brain cells die, the functions they provide are lost.
This includes memory, orientation, and the ability to think and reason.
The progression of the disease is slow and gradual.
On average, patients live five to seven years after diagnosis, but some may live ten to 15 years.
PRECORIOUS SYMPTOMS:
- Short-term memory loss
- Disorientation
- Behavior changes
- Mood swings
- Difficulty managing money or making a phone call
SUBSEQUENT SYMPTOMS:
- Serious memory loss, forgotten relatives, objects or familiar places
- Being anxious and frustrated by the inability to make sense of the world, which leads to aggressive behavior
- He eventually loses the ability to walk
- You may have trouble eating
- Most will eventually need 24 hour care
Source: Alzheimer’s Association
Imperial Professor Eric Aboagye, who led the study, said: “Currently no other simple and widely available method can predict Alzheimer’s disease with this level of accuracy, so our research is important. step forward.
“Waiting for a diagnosis can be a horrible experience for patients and their families.
“If we could reduce the time they have to wait, make the diagnosis an easier process and reduce some of the uncertainty, that would help a lot.
“If all goes well, hopefully this will be available in the NHS in two to three years.”
Alzheimer’s is the most common form of dementia, affecting more than half a million people in the United Kingdom and about 6 million in the United States.
The disease causes brain cells to die and areas of the brain to shrink.
To see how an MRI might detect these changes, the researchers looked at 172 people with the disease who had only mild cognitive impairment.
These minor memory problems, such as forgetting recent events or repeating the same question, are usually precursors to dementia, but can be confused with normal memory loss from aging.
The algorithm accurately identified these people in about three-quarters of the cases, even without using the results of memory tests.
It usually takes two to five years for mild cognitive impairment to turn into total dementia, and patients with suspected dementia can be monitored for months or even years before being diagnosed.
The algorithm looks for 660 different characteristics in the brain, detecting very subtle changes that the human eye could overlook.
Researchers found that there are surprising early signs of Alzheimer’s in regions of the brain that are never related to the disease, including the cerebellum, which regulates physical activity, and the ventral diencephalon, which is related to sight and hearing. .
The disease is known for its effect on memory. But researchers found that looking at the hippocampus, the “memory center” of the brain, only captures 26% of Alzheimer’s patients.
While there is no cure for Alzheimer’s disease, getting a diagnosis quickly helps patients access early support, get treatment to manage their symptoms, and plan for the future.
The algorithm developed to analyze brain scans returns a result overnight, currently between 10 and 12 hours.
Professor Aboagye said: “This could help people avoid weeks or months of anxiety after going to their GP for the first time while waiting for the results of cognitive tests and to get a diagnosis.”
The Imperial team also examined scans of people with other neurological conditions, including frontotemporal dementia and Parkinson’s, to see if the algorithm could differentiate disorders.
It was tested on 172 people with Alzheimer’s and 254 people with other neurological or healthy conditions.
Among them were 83 people from a memory clinic, with suspected dementia.
According to the study’s authors, brain scanning works better, with up to 98% accuracy, than other standard methods used for diagnosis.
A spinal cord to look at brain fluid that contains trademarked proteins linked to Alzheimer’s disease is 62% accurate.
Brain scans were not compared to PET scans for dementia.