Japan authorizes blood test to detect Alzheimer’s

The marketing of a test to detect Alzheimer’s disease from a simple blood test has been authorized in Japan, its manufacturer said on Thursday (22), a rare advance in the field of this very common neurodegenerative disease.

In a statement, the Japanese company Sysmex Corporation indicated that it intends to launch this minimally invasive diagnostic test in the Japanese market “as soon as possible”.

According to Sysmex, its system measures, in just over twenty-five minutes, the level of accumulation in the blood of the beta-amyloid protein, one of the main biomarkers of Alzheimer’s disease.

There are other methods available to diagnose this pathology, but they are usually expensive or invasive (brain imaging, lumbar puncture to extract cerebrospinal fluid), since it is essential to detect Alzheimer’s as soon as possible to try to stop its progression.

Other blood tests are being developed in other parts of the world or are awaiting marketing authorization.

“Simple, inexpensive, non-invasive, and easily accessible diagnostic tools are urgently needed” to improve early detection of Alzheimer’s disease, states the American NGO Alzheimer’s Association on its website.

In the future, blood tests “will likely revolutionize the diagnostic process for Alzheimer’s disease and all other dementias,” according to this organization.

Alzheimer’s disease remains incurable so far, but in November, additional clinical data confirmed the potential of a new drug, lecanemab, to significantly delay cognitive decline in patients treated for 18 months.

More than 55 million people worldwide suffer from dementia, a number expected to rise to 130 million by 2050 as life expectancy increases, according to the World Health Organization (WHO). Alzheimer’s disease accounts for between 60% and 70% of cases.