Identification of new risk factors or early signs of Alzheimer’s disease
23/02/2021 – What risk factors are associated with Alzheimer’s up to 15 years before the onset of the first symptoms? This is a vital question for specialists of this neurodegenerative disease – which develops over many years before becoming clinically visible – who aim to improve early prevention for at-risk patients. A multidisciplinary team of researchers from the Paris Brain Institute’s (INSERM/CNRS/Sorbonne University) Aramis project led by Stanley Durrleman (Inria), from INSERM/University of Bordeaux, and from Cegedim Health Data, analysed the anonymised health records of nearly 80,000 patients consulting general practitioners in France and the United Kingdom, taken from the THIN® database. The scientists identified ten pathologies developed more frequently by patients reporting Alzheimer’s dementia within 15 years than by other patients of the same age. Their results are published in the prestigious journal The Lancet Digital Health.