Trime of doctors blood test of £ 100 which could transform how the NHS detects Alzheimer’s | Alzheimer’s
Doctors launched a clinical trial of a blood test of £ 100 for Alzheimer’s disease in the hope of transforming the diagnosis of the devastating state in the NHS.
More than 1,000 patients suspected of dementia are recruited in memory clinics across the United Kingdom to see if the test leads to faster and more reliable diagnoses and to take care of those who have the disease.
More than half a million people in the United Kingdom have Alzheimer’s disease, the most common form of dementia, but obtaining a diagnosis can take years. Only around 2% of patients have a standard gold test based on a trial and riding wood to identify the characteristics of the disease.
Although new drugs such as Lecanemab and Donanemab slow down the disease, they have a small effect and have been rejected for general use by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (Nice) of the United Kingdom. Hopes are now on a second generation of Alzheimer’s drugs that are tested in clinical trials.
Alzheimer’s drugs work better when given in the early stages of the disease, before the brain suffered a major and irreversible damage. A simple and effective blood test would allow doctors to quickly identify patients who benefit the most.
“We expect many additional treatments to arise during the next 10 years, so we have to prepare the National Health Service now, to be able to deliver these treatments, as well as the advantages that a precise diagnosis already offers,” said Professor Jonathan Schott, neurologist at the University College of London and co-odexé on the Adapt.
Alzheimer’s disease is linked to the accumulation of two key proteins in the brain called amyloid and tau. The blood test measures a protein called P-Tau217 which reflects the presence of the two. The evidence suggests that the test can detect the amyloid and the tau as precisely as the analyzes of the PETs and the perforations of the wood.
The trial recruits 1,100 people from various geographic, ethnic and economic environments, and people with other medical problems to ensure that the results are relevant to a large British population.
Half people in the study will receive their blood test results within three months of their evaluation by their memory service, while the other half will receive their results after 12 months. Doctors will then assess whether test results help to accelerate the diagnosis and guide decisions about the future treatment of patients.
In specialized laboratories that already use the test, the results can be returned in about two weeks.
“It is not a question of confirming the accuracy, which we have already done,” said Dr. Ashvini Keshavan, researcher in the main clinic at the University College’s Dementia Research Center and co-directing during the test. “It is a question of showing that it actually makes a difference for the management of patients.”
Researchers suspect that it will take two years to recruit the trial. If the results are encouraging, they will be presented in Nice for a decision on the deployment of the test through the NHS.
The trial is part of the Blood Biomarker Challenge, a program of several million pounds supported by Alzheimer’s Society, Alzheimer’s Research UK and the Lottery of the Popular Postal Code.
“We know that the drug development pipeline for booming Alzheimer’s disease with new potential treatments,” said Dr. Sheona Scales, research director at Alzheimer’s Research UK.
“The earlier we can intervene with these experimental or new potential treatments, the more important their chances of success. Thus, science is currently evolving quickly, there is a rate of change, but we need the diagnosis to accelerate, to help us unlock this. ”
