A recent study led by the Knight Family Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer Network-Trials Unit (DIAN-TU) at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis offers evidence that early intervention with anti-amyloid drugs may delay the onset of Alzheimer's dementia in individuals genetically predisposed to develop the disease at a young age. The DIAN-TU-001 trial was a randomised, placebo-controlled, double-blind, phase 2/3 study evaluating the anti-amyloid drugs solanezumab and gantenerumab in individuals with autosomal dominant Alzheimer’s disease, followed by an open-label extension (OLE) of gantenerumab. Conducted across multiple international sites, the study included participants ranging from 15 years before, to 10 years after their estimated symptom onset.
The Lancet Neurology publication focused on 73 participants carrying rare genetic mutations that lead to the overproduction of amyloid in the brain, virtually ensuring the development of Alzheimer's dementia in their 30s to 50s. Among a subgroup of 22 participants who were cognitively normal at the study's onset and received the experimental drug gantenerumab for an average of eight years, the risk of developing symptoms was reduced from nearly 100% to approximately 50%. Partial or short-term administration of anti-amyloid treatments did not show significant clinical effects. According to the scientists, further studies are needed, however these initial findings suggest that removing amyloid plaques from the brain years before symptoms appear could delay the onset of Alzheimer's dementia, in people with a strong genetic predisposition to develop dementia. Read the news release from Washington University:
https://medicine.washu.edu/news/anti-amyloid-drug-shows-signs-of-preventing-alzheimers-dementia/
