Recently, according to the research team of Xuanwu Hospital of Capital Medical University in China, a 19-year-old diagnosed case of Alzheimer's disease (AD) was reported in an internationally renowned research journal. It is reported that this is the youngest Alzheimer's patient who has been reported so far.

Is Alzheimer's starting to get younger?

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a neurodegenerative disease characterized by impairments in memory, thinking, analysis and judgment, visuospatial recognition, and emotion. AD is often colloquially referred to as "senile dementia". In fact, aging is an important risk factor for neurodegenerative diseases including AD.

Nowadays, most people have irregular life, high mental stress and poor sleep quality due to the accelerated pace of life. At the same time, unhealthy living habits and diet will increase the number of people with high blood pressure, diabetes, hyperlipidemia and obesity, and these factors will make more and more people suffer from cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, so Alzheimer The population with Haimer's disease is also getting younger.

So, what is the difference between Alzheimer's disease and normal aging, and how to distinguish it early? Generally speaking, the difference between the two is reflected in the following aspects:

1. Forgetfulness VS Memory Impairment

Senile amnesia is manifested as short-term memory impairment, which is partial and can be recalled after prompting, while Alzheimer's disease is mainly short-term memory impairment, which is complete and cannot be recalled after prompting.

Moreover, amnesia will not be accompanied by other cognitive impairments, while Alzheimer's patients are often accompanied by executive function, visual space function, language function impairment, and lack of sound reasoning and analysis ability.

2. About self-care ability

Forgetful old people can maintain normal self-care ability, while the old people with Alzheimer's disease will gradually lose the ability to take care of themselves even if there is no physical disease.

If the above situation occurs, especially the elderly or people with family history, they should go to the relevant outpatient clinic as soon as possible. Doctors will use professional scales to evaluate, cooperate with brain MR, PET-CT, cerebrospinal fluid examination, etc. After diagnosis, early drug intervention can delay the progression of the disease.

How can NMN help with early intervention?

It is understood that heredity, environment and aging are the three major influencing factors leading to the onset of Alzheimer's disease. At present, there is no drug that can cure Alzheimer's disease, and clinical diagnostic techniques and methods are long-term problems. Early identification and early intervention are the most effective ways to delay Alzheimer's disease.

The study found that NMN significantly reduced beta-amyloid production, brain amyloid plaque burden, loss of brain synapses, and inflammatory responses in transgenic animals.

In terms of clinical research, the Norwegian Haukeland University Hospital and the Department of Clinical Medicine of the University of Bergen published research results on Cell Metabolism: the intake of NAD+ precursors can increase the level of NAD+ in the brains of patients with Parkinson's disease, thereby protecting the nervous system and improving Parkinson's disease effect of the disease.

In 2022, a study published in GENE showed that the combined use of NMN and lycopene can effectively improve the learning and memory ability of aging rats, and play an effective role in reducing the oxidative stress of aging rats and aging PC12 cells (nerve cell lines). role.

Nicotinamide mononucleotide (NMN) can help restore cognition in Alzheimer's rats, evidence shows. The beneficial effects of NMN are produced by improving the survival of nerve cells, improving energy metabolism and reducing the accumulation of reactive oxygen species (ROS) in the hippocampus of brain tissue. These results suggest that NMN is promising to cooperate with the improvement of Alzheimer's disease.

The positive effect of NMN on Alzheimer's disease may become a new breakthrough and bring hope to tens of millions of AD patients around the world.

Reference source:

1.Nicotinamide mononucleotide inhibits JNK activation to reverse Alzheimer disease. (2017)

2.NAD replenishment with nicotinamide mononucleotide protects blood-brain barrier integrity and attenuates delayed tissue plasminogen activator-induced haemorrhagic transformation after cerebral ischaemia. (2017)

3.Effect of nicotinamide mononucleotide on brain mitochondrial respiratory deficits in an Alzheimer’s disease-relevant murine model (2015)

4.Nicotinamide mononucleotide protects against β-amyloid oligomer-induced cognitive impairment and neuronal death. (2016)