Signs of early Alzheimer's

Filed in archive News on August 3, 2005

Researchers have come up with signs of "pre-clinical" Alzheimer's:

The authors studied 47 peer-reviewed studies published between January 1985 and February 2003. The year 1985 marked the introduction of more systematic and reliable diagnostic criteria for Alzheimer's.

The analysis showed that no matter what kind of study, people at the preclinical stage showed marked preclinical deficits in global cognitive ability, episodic memory, perceptual speed, and executive functioning; along with somewhat smaller deficits in verbal ability, visuospatial skill, and attention. There was no preclinical impairment in primary memory.

("Early warning aigns of Alzheimer's show up across cognitive areas years before official diagnosis", News-Medical.Net, Aug.4)