This is quite old but I can't remember it being posted
New Study May Have Found a Way to Reverse Alzheimer’s Symptoms Within Minutes
Posted on January 14th, 2008
An amazing new study, published in the Journal of Neuroinflammation, has documented improvement in the brain of a patient suffering from Alzheimer’s disease within minutes of administrating a therapeutic molecule.
The researches involved with the study hypothesized that the increased amount of TNF (tumor necrosis factor-alpha), a critical component of the brain’s immune system that finely regulates the transmission of neural impulses in the brain, might cause interference with the regulation. Too much TNF, they supposed, might cause some of the effects on the brain that are normally associated with the Alzheimer’s Disease.
To reduce elevated TNF, the authors gave patients an injection of an anti-TNF therapeutic called etanercept. Etanercept (trade name Enbrel) binds and inactivates excess TNF. Etanercept is FDA approved to treat a number of immune-mediated disorders and is used off label in the study.
The study outlines the “rapid cognitive improvement, beginning within minutes, using this same anti-TNF treatment modality, in a patient with late-onset Alzheimer’s disease.” Many other patients with mild to severe Alzheimer’s received the treatment and all have shown sustained and marked improvement.
“It is unprecedented that we can see cognitive and behavioral improvement in a patient with established dementia within minutes of therapeutic intervention,” said researcher Sue Griffin, Ph.D., director of research at the Donald W. Reynolds Institute on Aging at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) in Little Rock and at the Geriatric Research and Clinical Center at the VA Hospital in Little Rock.
The new study, entitled “Rapid cognitive improvement in Alzheimer’s disease following perispinal etanercept administration,” and the accompanying commentary, entitled “Perispinal etanercept: Potential as an Alzheimer’s therapeutic,” are available on the Web site of the Journal of Neuroinflammation.
