A shortage of a protein called TDP-43 caused muscle wasting and stunted nerve cells. This finding supports the idea that malfunction of this protein plays a decisive role in ALS and FTD. The study is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
ALS is an incurable neurological disease which manifests as rapidly progressing muscle wasting. Both limbs and respiratory muscles are affected. This leads to impaired mobility and breathing problems. Patients commonly die within a few years after the symptoms emerged. In rare cases, of which the British physicist Stephen Hawking is the most notable, patients can live with the disease for a long time. In Germany estimates show over 150,000 patients suffering from ALS — an average of 1 in 500 people.
Proteins gone astray
Over the last few years, there has been increasing evidence that ALS and FTD — a form of dementia associated with changes in personality and social behavior — may have similar or even the same origins. The symptoms overlap and common factors have also been found at the microscopic level. In many cases, particles accumulate and form clumps in the patient’s nerve cells: this applies particularly to the TDP-43 protein.
Full story of molecules and dementia at Science Daily
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Beedie Savage – President of Quantum Units Education
Drinking coffee and tea rich in antioxidants may not lower your risk of dementia or having a stroke, according to a new study published Wednesday in the online journal Neurology.
The study may call into question other research suggesting a diet high in antioxidants helps reduce the risk of dementia and stroke.
Researchers followed approximately 5,400 people aged 55 years and older for nearly 14 years. The participants had no signs of dementia when they began the study and most had never had a stroke. They were questioned about how often they ate 170 foods over the course of the past year and they were divided into three groups based on the levels of antioxidants in their diet – low, moderate or high.
Antioxidants are vitamins, minerals and other nutrients that help protect your cells and repair cell damage caused by free radicals. Free radicals, molecules responsible for aging and tissue damage, may be a factor in heart disease, cancer and other disease.
Full story of antioxidants preventing dementia and stroke at CNN Health
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Beedie Savage – President of Quantum Units Education
Older Americans who have hearing loss have an accelerated decline in thinking and memory abilities, compared to those with normal hearing, according to a study published in JAMA Archives of Internal Medicine.
Those with hearing loss experience a 30% to 40% greater decline in thinking abilities compared to their counterparts without hearing loss, according to the findings published Monday.
Hearing loss is common among old older adults, affecting about two-thirds of adults 70 and older, and about one-third of adults younger than 60, according to lead study author Dr. Frank R. Lin of Johns Hopkins University. A large number of people with hearing loss are untreated, Lin explained, because they associate hearing loss with the stigma of getting older.
About two years ago Lin and his associates published a paper showing that hearing loss was associated with greater risk for developing dementia. “Fortunately most of us will never develop dementia, but most of us will experience some kind of cognitive decline over time,” explained Lin.
Full story of hearing loss and memory decline at CNN Health
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Beedie Savage – President of Quantum Units Education
A new way to use MRI scans may help determine whether dementia is Alzheimer’s disease or another type of dementia, according to new research published in the December 26, 2012, online issue of Neurology®, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology.
Alzheimer’s disease and frontotemporal lobar degeneration (FTLD) often have similar symptoms, even though the underlying disease process is much different.
"Diagnosis can be challenging," said study author Corey McMillan, PhD, of the Perelman School of Medicine and Frontotemporal Degeneration Center at the University of Pennsylvania and a member of the American Academy of Neurology. "If the clinical symptoms and routine brain MR are equal, an expensive positron emission tomography (PET) scan might be needed. Or, a lumbar puncture, which involves inserting a needle into the spine, would be needed to help make the diagnosis. Analysis of the cerebrospinal fluid gives us reliable diagnostic information, but this is not something patients look forward to and is also expensive. Using this new MRI method is less expensive and definitely less invasive."
Full story of MRI diagnosing Dementia at Science Daily
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Beedie Savage – President of Quantum Units Education
People who have symptoms of depression in middle age may be at increased risk of dementia decades later, a new study suggests.
Using medical records, researchers tracked more than 13,000 people in a large northern California health plan from roughly their 40s and 50s into their 80s. Compared to people who had never been depressed, those who experienced symptoms of depression in middle age — but not later in life — were about 20% more likely to go on to develop dementia.
Those who received a depression diagnosis later in life only were at even greater risk. That group had about a 70% increased risk of dementia compared to their depression-free peers, according to the study, which was published this week in the Archives of General Psychiatry.
Full story of depression and dementia at CNN
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A shortage of a protein called TDP-43 caused muscle wasting and stunted nerve cells. This finding supports the idea that malfunction of this protein plays a decisive role in ALS and FTD. The study is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
