Bracing for the Alzheimer's Surge

June 14, 2007 — -- "It's very sad. It's a very sad disease. It's sad to watch. It's sad when she asks who you are [and] doesn't remember her own grandson, but that's part of the progression."

Having spent the last 12 years caring for her ailing mother, Mary Dickson has seen the effects of Alzheimer's, a progressive disease of the brain that affects more than 5.5 million people in the United States firsthand. Over time, people with Alzheimer's experience a gradual loss of memory and a weakened ability to learn, reason and make judgments.

"It's estimated that there are 26.5 million people in the world with [Alzheimer's disease], and it's expected to quadruple by the year 2050," said Ronald Petersen, vice chair of the Medical Scientific Advisory Council of the Alzheimer's Association. "We're talking huge numbers of people who will develop it."

But at a conference that ended Tuesday in Washington, D.C., scientists from all over the world met to look at ways to change that.

The International Conference on Prevention of Dementia, held by the Alzheimer's Association this week, aimed to bring people together to discuss new treatments and ways to catch this disease before it strikes.

"The problem is huge, and we need to identify it early and treat it early," Petersen said. "And it looks like we're getting there on those two fronts."

In terms of treatments, researchers appeared optimistic that new ways to fight the disease were on the horizon.

One of the new hopefuls is a drug called Dimebon, which was originally used in the treatment of allergies. A Russian study of 120 patients suggested it may be able to improve the lives of Alzheimer's patients in terms of mental capacity and daily activities.

For a disease in which progressive decline is the norm, this is good news.

"It has subsequently been found out that Dimebon has multiple targets within the brain cells and some of them are targets that other drugs do not have," said Rachelle Doody, a professor of neurology at Baylor College of Medicine. Doody contributed to the study.