Alzheimer’s Disease – More Insight

The August 1, 2019 issue of the journal Neurology carried a report of a team of researchers who have developed a blood test that can detect the presence of amyloid in the brain with 94% accuracy.  Amyloid is one of the chemical constituents found to be tangling up the neuron nerve communication pathways in humans with Alzheimer’s disease.

The article emphasizes this is currently a strict research tool. It is not a laboratory test that your physician or clinic can order or use to detect this form of dementia early. The results of the blood test correlate well with imaging studies currently in use. It is one small step in the investigation of the causes of this progressive, and fatal, heartbreaking disease and hopefully will allow us to evaluate Alzheimer’s at its earliest stages.

In a journal specifically dedicated to this disease entitled Alzheimer’s and Dementia, researchers at the University of California, San Francisco discussed the increased tendency of patients with Alzheimer’s disease to nap and sleep inappropriately and ineffectively. Previously it was felt that this inappropriate sleep pattern when observed was in fact a risk factor and marker for the development of the disease.

Lea Grinberg, MD and her co-authors feel it is a symptom of the disease instead. They believe that the disease process has already destroyed or inhibited those neurons (brain nerve cells) responsible for wakefulness and alertness. In the absence of this stimulation, patients nap and sleep ineffectively and inappropriately.

Imaging of these areas is difficult to obtain because of their location in the skull and brain but, on detailed studies, more tau protein deposition in these wakefulness areas is visualized.   This concept now allows researchers to zero in on other brain chemicals associated with wakefulness, alertness and sleep as a potential form of treatment of Alzheimer’s disease in addition to those chemicals in the cholinergic system that most medications attack.

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Do Tomatoes Prevent Strokes?

The University of Pennsylvania Department Of Medicine online magazine Medpage Today published a synopsis of an article that appeared in the October 9^th issue of the Journal of Neurology. Written by Jouni Karppi, PhD, of the University of Eastern Finland, and colleagues, it discusses how tomatoes and tomato based products may lower the risk of strokes in men. The key ingredient seems to be lycopene. Lycopene is a carotenoid that acts as an antioxidant.

The study looked at 1,031 Finnish men between the ages of 42 and 61 who were followed for 12 plus years. The researchers used statistical techniques to eliminate the influence of variables such as hypertension, tobacco usage, lipid levels and other risk factors of strokes. The research showed that the individuals with the highest levels of lycopene in their serum had the lowest risk of stroke compared to individuals with lower levels. Tomatoes do contain several types of carotenoids such as alpha-carotene, beta-carotene, alpha–tocopherol and retinol, but it is the lycopene that is the difference maker.

Nancy Copperman, MS, RD from the North Shore- Long Island Jewish Health System was quoted as saying, “This study supports the recommendation of eating more servings of fruit and vegetables a day. Foods such as tomatoes, guava, watermelon and grapefruit are good sources of lycopene. When a tomato is cooked, the heat processing actually increases the levels of cis-lycopene – which is easily absorbed by the body.”

This explains why tomato sauce is felt to be such an excellent source of anti-oxidants. Lycopene is believed to have numerous additional health benefits including “reducing inflammation, blocking cholesterol synthesis, boosting immune function, and inhibiting platelet aggregation and thrombosis.”