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Journal of Neurology

Brain thinning detected before dementia in people under 65

An observational study of 292 people under 65 linked two positive Alzheimer’s-related spinal-fluid tests to earlier and more extensive thinning.

Paper by Alessandro Zilioli, Rosaleena Mohanty, Anna Rosenberg, +5 more authorsEric Westman
Fig. 1. Cortical thinning pattern in EOAD dementia compared to the reference group of A−/T1− SCD.
Open the figure at full size
Fig. 1. Cortical thinning pattern in EOAD dementia compared to the reference group of A−/T1− SCD.Cortical thinning pattern in EOAD dementia compared to the reference group of A−/T1− SCD.Zilioli et al.

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Biomarkers
Studied:
Cross-sectional study of 292 people
Why it’s aging research:
It bears on staying healthy in midlife and later life.

Editor of record: Boris Djordjevic · AgingResearch.News

Paper
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An observational study examined 292 people under 65 with brain scans and spinal-fluid tests. Researchers tested for amyloid-beta and a modified form of tau, proteins used as Alzheimer’s markers. They defined a thinning pattern in the brain’s outer layer by comparing people with test-confirmed Alzheimer’s dementia against a reference group with subjective cognitive decline—self-reported worsening of thinking—who tested negative for both markers.

In mild cognitive impairment, which involves problems with memory or thinking, thinning was more extensive when both markers were positive than when only amyloid was positive. In subjective cognitive decline, localized thinning was detected with both markers positive, but no structural changes were detected with only amyloid positive. Thinning was associated with memory for events and spatial information in mild cognitive impairment. No links between brain structure and thinking performance were found in subjective cognitive decline.

Why it matters

For early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, a key question is how brain structure changes before dementia. This work examined whether fluid-marker profiles were associated with different patterns at those earlier stages.

Caveats

The observational comparisons cannot show how thinning progressed within individuals. Researchers also selected the thinning pattern from differences between the dementia and reference groups.

From the paper

Participants

The study sample comprised 292 participants (mean age 58.0 ± 5.1 years; 61.8% female).

Results, Study population characteristics

Limitation

The cross-sectional design precludes causal inference regarding individual disease trajectories.

Discussion

Quoted word for word from the full text on link.springer.com.

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