View clinical trials related to Alzheimer Disease.
Filter by:The aim of this study is to explore the relationship between cortical hyperexcitability, abnormalities of brain network function, and cognitive dysfunction in human patients with AD and whether administration of the antiepileptic medication levetiracetam (LEV) normalizes these measures and improves cognition.
This study will test the effects of different doses of a form of non-invasive brain stimulation for the treatment of individuals with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and dementia of the Alzheimer's Type (DAT).
The Atlas of Retinal Imaging in Alzheimer's (ARIAS) study is a 5-year study examining the natural history of retinal imaging biomarkers associated with disease risk, disease burden, and disease progression in Alzheimer's disease (AD). The objective of this project is to create a 'gold standard' reference database of structural anatomic and functional imaging of the retina, in order to enable the identification and development of both sensitive and reliable markers of AD risk and/or progression. Our ultimate goal is to develop a new screening protocol that identifies changes related to AD 10-20 years before AD is clinically visible.
The purpose of this research study is to understand the factors that underlie changes in thinking and memory with increasing age. The investigators will test the usefulness of MRI, PET, and cognitive testing in detecting subtle changes in the brain that precede cognitive decline. An addendum to this study includes additional PET scans to examine the relationship between tau protein in the brain and cognitive decline. Tau is a protein that is known to form tangles in the areas of the brain important for memory, and these tau tangles are a hallmark of Alzheimer's disease. This sub-study research aims to look at the tau accumulation in the brain using an investigational drug called MK-6240, which is a radio tracer that gets injected prior to a positron emission tomography (PET) scan.
By doing this study, researchers hope to learn how the ketogenic and Therapeutic Lifestyles Changes diets affect cognition in patients with Alzheimer's disease.
The study will explore the impact of photobiomodulation (PBM), pulsating at frequencies of red (660nm) and near-infrared (810nm)(NIR), concurrent with a ketogenic dietary protocol (serum ketones @ .5 - 2.0 mmol/L) to mediate vascular features of diabetic retinopathy (DR), diabetic macular edema (DME), age-related macular degeneration (AMD), mid-peripheral drusens, visual acuity and retinal disorders. Red and near-infrared light via light-emitting diode (LED) treatment promotes retinal healing and improves visual acuity by augmenting cellular energy metabolism, enhancing mitochondrial function, increasing cytochrome C oxidase activity, stimulating antioxidant protective pathways and promoting cell survival. LED therapy directly benefits neurons in the retina, the lateral geniculate nucleus and the visual cortex; likewise, a ketogenic dietary protocol shows metabolic and neuro-modulatory benefits within the CNS, most notably as treatment for refractory epilepsy. Photobiomodulation has been approved as a non-significant risk (NSR) modality for the treatment of eye disorders.
Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the leading cause of dementia and its prevalence is estimated to exceed 100 million affects by 2050, becoming the main public health problem worldwide. AD is considered a clinicopathological entity characterized by a progressive cognitive impairment with affectation of memory and other cognitive domains, which underlies a neuropathological pattern with extracellular accumulation of β-amyloid protein (Aβ) in the form of neuritic plaques, intracellular deposits of tau protein in the form of neuritic strands and neurofibrillary tangles, neuronal and synaptic loss and glial proliferation. Classically, its definitive diagnosis implied the existence of a clinical phenotype compatible with dementia, together with the neuropathological findings characteristic of the disease. More recently, evidence of clinical and biological changes leading to the dementia phase has led to the development of new diagnostic criteria that divide the course of AD into 3 stages: (1) a pre-clinical phase, which would include persons with positive biomarkers with normal cognitive performance for their age and educational level; (2) a phase of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), characterized by cognitive performance lower than expected by age and educational level; and (3) a dementia phase, once cognitive deficits interfere with the activities of daily living. Recent research has also shed light into the subdivision of each of the above-mentioned stages in distinct phases. For example, the existence of a subjective perception of cognitive decline or a subtle cognitive decline, have been postulated as phases within the AD preclinical stage. The lack of positive results in the different clinical trials performed to date in patients with AD dementia has redirected the focus of therapeutic strategies towards preventing the development of dementia. For this reason, a detailed characterization of the successive clinical and biological changes that lead to the dementia stage is of vital importance in identifying the persons who could benefit from a possible preventive strategy, as well as the optimal moment to carry out the intervention. The the scientific community, is convinced that intervention aiming to prevent the clinical development of AD dementia must be implemented several years before the first symptoms arise. In this context, the present project is developed under the hypothesis that subjective cognitive decline (SCD) in individuals with a performance in cognitive tests within normality represents the first symptomatic manifestation of AD. In persons with SCD, the presence of a higher intensity of subjective complaint quantified using a specific subjective complaint questionnaire (SCD-Q) will be associated with lower cognitive performance and a higher rate of conversion to MCI and/or dementia. The relationship between the perception of cognitive decline by the subject and his/her relative will differently vary depending on the stage of the disease: in subjects with progressive cognitive impairment, the subjective perception of cognitive decline will decrease with disease progression whereas the perception of decline will increase with disease progression in their relatives. The degree of perception of cognitive decline throughout the different phases of the disease will be correlated with cognitive and affective patterns as well as with changes in AD biomarkers. These changes will be related to specific brain patterns and abnormal levels of AD biomarkers, which on the other hand will also be present in patients with MCI and mild dementia due to AD. The present study has two main objectives that are: 1. To characterize from a cognitive and biomarker (when available) point of view persons with SCD and to study its association with the risk of presenting a progressive cognitive deterioration. 2. To study the evolution of the subjective perception of cognitive impairment by the participants and their relatives and to analyze its impact in cognitive, affective and functional terms along the clinical-biological continuum of AD.
Dementia is the most expensive medical condition in the US and increases in prevalence with age. More than 5 million Americans have Alzheimer's disease, the most common form of dementia. Mild cognitive impairment is a transitional stage between normal cognitive aging and Alzheimer's disease or another type of dementia, and is indicative of higher risk for dementia. In addition to the obvious health and quality-of-life ramifications of dementia, there are high direct (e.g., subsidizing residential care needs) and indirect (e.g., lost productivity of family caregivers) economic costs. Implementing interventions to prevent MCI and dementia among older adults is of critical importance to health and maintained quality-of-life for millions of Americans. Recent data analyses from the Advanced Cognitive Training in Vital Elderly study (ACTIVE) indicate that a specific cognitive intervention, speed of processing training (SPT), significantly delays the incidence of cognitive impairment across 10 years. The primary contribution of the proposed research will be the determination of whether this cognitive training technique successfully delays the onset of clinically defined MCI or dementia across three years.
Agitation and aggression impose a tremendous burden on the individuals living with dementia, their families, caregivers, and healthcare systems. Neuropsychiatric symptoms of dementia (NPS) affect up to 80% of patients with Alzheimer's dementia (AD). The mechanisms of agitation in AD are poorly understood and the current interventions are only modestly effective while having serious adverse effects. In this study, the investigators propose to assess the mechanisms and treatment of neuropsychiatric symptoms in AD with the use of non-invasive, brain stimulation approaches. By applying magnetic stimulation to the surface of the head (transcranial magnetic stimulation - TMS) combined with electroencephalography (EEG), the investigators will be able to study the mechanisms of agitation and advance our understanding of AD. Further, the investigators will evaluate if transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS) is effective to treat agitation dementia.
Patient Power is a patient research network and database (registry) to collect prospective information about demographics, self-reported diagnoses and medications, and willingness to participate in research from participants with rheumatoid arthritis (RA), spondyloarthritis (SpA), other musculoskeletal conditions, chronic neurological conditions like migraine, chronic pulmonary conditions like Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), asthma, autoimmune dermatological conditions such as psoriasis, and other chronic inflammatory or immune-mediated conditions. In addition, since patients with chronic conditions often have other co-morbidities like cardiovascular health and obesity-related metabolic disorders, these conditions will also be included. Participants will provide information from their smartphones or personal computers. The information will be used by researchers and clinicians to help patients and their providers make better, more informed decisions about treatment of chronic conditions.