News

Cumbersome security procedures, rising airfares, and shrinking legroom have made commercial air travel difficult enough these days — even for healthy passengers. Imagine how much harder it is for patients with rare diseases who must get to doctors’ appointments or clinical trials that are hundreds of miles away from home.

Long-term use of thiazide diuretics — a hypertension medication — may lower the risk of bone fractures, particularly hip fractures, in people with Alzheimer’s, a disease with a high risk of fractures due to falls, a Finnish study suggests. The study, “Long-term thiazide use and risk of…

Blood levels of a nerve cell-derived component, known as neurofilament light chain, could be used as a biomarker of disease severity and treatment response in patients with Alzheimer’s disease, a study suggests. The study, ”Association Between Longitudinal Plasma Neurofilament Light and Neurodegeneration in Patients With Alzheimer’s Disease,” was published…

Tau bio-logic and LifeArc researchers have generated a human-like antibody called TBL-100 for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP). An antibody is a large Y-shaped protein that’s naturally produced in response to invading foreign particles (antigens) such as viruses. A humanized…

A cellular model that simulates the blood-brain barrier — a membrane that protects against viruses or other insults entering through the blood stream — may help in understanding how potential treatments for neurological diseases like Alzheimer’s could better cross that barrier to reach the brain and central nervous system, its creators…

Cognitive training alone — without the use of direct brain stimulation — may significantly benefit adults with mild cognitive impairment, a known risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease, a pilot clinical study reports. The study, “Cognitive Training and Transcranial Direct Current Stimulation in Mild Cognitive Impairment: A Randomized Pilot Trial,”…

Treatment with naproxen, an anti-inflammatory medication, failed to prevent the progression of Alzheimer’s in individuals at risk of developing the disease, results from a Phase 2 clinical trial show. The results, “INTREPAD: A randomized trial of naproxen to slow progress of…

While caregiving for people with Alzheimer’s and other disorders has a significant detrimental impact on caregivers’ immune system, the association is weak — less than 1% — and may not carry clinical significance, a new study shows. “We’re not saying that family caregiving can’t be stressful, but there’s a notion…

To enable researchers to study prospective links between sleep and dementia, a cutting-edge sleep unit has opened at the University of East Anglia (UEA) in Norwich, England. While sleeping issues commonly occur in dementia, it’s unclear whether diseases such as Alzheimer’s cause the disturbances, or whether problems sleeping signal…

A Phase 1 trial evaluating Samumed’s investigational compound SM07883 for Alzheimer’s disease has dosed its first participant. The Phase 1 trial (ACTRN12619000327189), taking place in Australia, will assess the safety, tolerability, and pharmacokinetics (the movement of a medicine into, through, and out of the body) of ascending doses…