New studies may find a treatment for Alzheimer's in upcoming years!

In a recent article, provided by HealthDay, and titled In Mice, Cancer Drug Shows Effect on Alzheimer’s Symptoms (read article here), I read some pretty interesting news. Alzheimer’s is a disease that affects people all over the world, and can be one of the hardest diseases to deal with as a family member. (Read more about Alzheimer’s here). The article talks about the drug, bexarotene, which quickly eliminates Alzheimer’s disease related amyloid beta from the brain and reverses memory problems in mice.

The article states the results suggest that the drug could possibly help the many Americans (about 5.4 million!) that have Alzheimer’s disease according to the neuroscientists at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine. Although the studies of using the drug bexarotene, which is a drug that is used to treat skin problems caused by cutaneous T-cell lymphoma, to lessen the effects of Alzheimer’s on animals, a lot of times they fail to produce similar results in humans.

                When the body is unable to clear amyloid beta from the brain is a big risk factor for the development of Alzheimer’s disease. Research has showed that the main cholesterol carrier in the brain, apolipoportein E, plays an important role in the clearing amyloid beta proteins. Bexarotene increased the release of the apolipoprotein which then boosted the clearance of amyloid beta from the brain. Six hours after the mice received bexarotene treatment, levels of amyloid fell by twenty five percent.

                Even though at this time, studies have not been conducted on humans, the study is still very promising because it says that there just may be treatment for the devastating disease!  I have not personally had anyone of my family members affected by this awful disease, but I have seen friends go through this disease with their family members, and it is just awful to see and hear how much Alzheimer’s in someone you love. After doing a little outside research, I found this website that talks about how to cope with Alzheimer's when a family member has the disease. Read that website here.