- With Mayo Clinic Alzheimer's disease specialist
Ronald Petersen, M.D.
Risk factors (2)
- Alzheimer's: Can a head injury increase my risk?
- Oophorectomy (ovary removal): A risk factor for dementia?
Symptoms (1)
- Sundowning: Late-day confusion
Tests and diagnosis (2)
- Rapid-onset Alzheimer's: Could it be something else?
- Alzheimer's test: Detection at the earliest stages
Complications (1)
- Phantosmia: What causes olfactory hallucinations?
Treatments and drugs (4)
- Folic acid supplements: Can they slow cognitive decline?
- Alzheimer's nose spray: New Alzheimer's treatment?
- Vitamin B-12: Can it improve memory in Alzheimer's?
- see all in Treatments and drugs
Alternative medicine (4)
- Axona: Medical food to treat Alzheimer's
- Phosphatidylserine supplements: Can they improve memory?
- Vitamin B-12: Can it improve memory in Alzheimer's?
- see all in Alternative medicine
Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Question
Alzheimer's test: Detection at the earliest stages
I read about an experimental test that can detect early stages of Alzheimer's disease. How does it work?
Answer
from Ronald Petersen, M.D.
Researchers from several Alzheimer's disease research centers have proposed an Alzheimer's test that measures two proteins, beta-amyloid and tau proteins, in cerebrospinal fluid. In a study, these proteins helped identify people with mild Alzheimer's disease and mild cognitive impairment (MCI) who were likely to progress to more-serious forms of the disease.
The Alzheimer's test is done on fluid obtained by a lumbar puncture, also called spinal tap. During a lumbar puncture, a doctor inserts a needle into the spinal canal and removes a small amount of cerebrospinal fluid — the fluid that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. The fluid is examined for evidence of abnormal development of beta-amyloid proteins, which form plaques, and tau proteins, which form tangles. Both plaques and tangles are thought to contribute to the development of Alzheimer's disease.
Early detection and diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease is important for early intervention with medications that may slow the progression of the disease. This Alzheimer's test also may reveal who will develop Alzheimer's disease in the future. However, more research is needed to determine who might benefit from the Alzheimer's test and what the test reveals about the progression of Alzheimer's disease.
Next questionPhantosmia: What causes olfactory hallucinations?
- Shaw LM, et al. Cerebrospinal fluid biomarker signature in Alzheimer's disease neuroimaging initiative subjects. Annals of Neurology. 2009;65:403.
- Petersen RC (expert opinion). Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. April 4, 2009.
- Inside the brain: An interactive tour. Alzheimer's Association. http://www.alz.org/alzheimers_disease_4719.asp. Accessed May 5, 2009.
