brain or a lumbar puncture to test cerebrospinal fluid.
These blood tests will need to be tested further and will need to be cleared by the FDA to make sure that they are reliable before they can be used to qualify patients for these new treatments.
What are the risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease?
Age is one of the main risk factors for developing dementia later in life. Others include family history, especially having dementia diagnosed in a first-degree relative.
People who have had traumatic brain injury or have had a stroke or have Parkinson’s disease or other neurologic conditions may also be at increased risk of developing dementia.
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What can people do to reduce their risk of Alzheimer’s disease?
So, what we need to do is to make sure that our brains get the blood supply that they need, and that is best assured by a healthy lifestyle: good diet, good sleep, exercise, increased socialization to make sure those connections between brain cells are nice and healthy. And of course, protecting your brain from trauma by wearing a helmet when you cycle or skate, wearing a seatbelt when you’re driving, is important.
So, it’s really a combination of things in order to reduce the overall risk. Just like we do for our hearts and our bodies, we need to have a multimodal approach to risk reduction of brain disease, including Alzheimer’s disease.
By Cedars-Sinai