Researchers identify brain changes 20 years before Alzheimer’s diagnosis

Researchers in Barcelona have identified brain changes 20 years before Alzheimer’s diagnosis.

SCIENTISTS at the Hospital Sant Pau studied 300 people, and, using new magnetic resonance imaging techniques, claim to have detected brain alterations in healthy patients two decades before the disease was diagnosed.

The new magnetic resonance technique – developed at the hospital – allows them to measure the movement of water in the brain and to estimate at what point in their lives the participants would develop the first clinical symptoms of the disease.

The researchers claim the data “proves there are changes in the cerebral cortex about 20 years before the first alterations in memory appear”.

This “allows us to understand better the disease, studying the trajectory of these alterations long before the clinical symptoms appear”.

According to neurologist Juan Fortea, lead researcher of the project, “the new data obtained will have a great implication when designing future studies to understand unexpected findings of clinical trials with anti-amyloid therapies”.

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