Month: August 2013

A new study offers clues to early symptoms of a brain disease linked with head trauma that has affected football players and other athletes. The study focused on chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). This disease causes brain damage that gets worse over time. People with CTE often are depressed and may show impulsive or erratic behavior. The new study included 36 male athletes who had been diagnosed with CTE after death. Their ages when they died ranged from 17 to 98. Most of them had played football as professionals or amateurs. The rest had been involved in hockey, wrestling or boxing. Researchers interviewed their relatives and asked about early symptoms related to thinking or behavior. They found that 22 of the athletes had behavior or mood problems as their first symptoms of CTE. Eleven had memory or thinking problems first. Three had no symptoms up to their time of death.

The United States has 10 times as many Lyme disease cases each year as the official numbers report. That’s the conclusion of new research by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). More than 30,000 cases of Lyme disease are reported to the CDC each year. But 3 new studies suggest that doctors actually diagnose and treat about 300,000 cases a year. One study is based on medical insurance claims. One uses a survey of clinical laboratories that test for Lyme disease. The third study looks at self-reported Lyme disease, based on a survey of the public. CDC officials were not surprised that their official numbers had been low. They presented their early estimates, based on the 3 studies, at a conference on tick-borne diseases. Final estimates will be published when the studies are completed. HealthDay News wrote about the research August 19.

A study involving mice has led to a new theory about the cause of Alzheimer’s disease. Researchers compared autopsy brain tissue from mice of various ages, a human baby and an older person. They focused on an immune system protein called C1q, which builds up even in healthy brains as they age. Levels of C1q were 300 times as high in older brains as in younger ones. C1q built up mostly at synapses, the junctions between nerve cells. This possibly could get in the way of signals between cells that allow the brain to function. C1q plays a role in the brain in childhood, when some synapses are “pruned” away to allow others to develop. In the immune system, C1q clings to foreign bodies, such as bacteria, or to pieces of dying cells. This sets off a chain reaction. Other proteins build up on top of the C1q. Then other immune system cells gulp down the object.

Researchers say they have found a way to predict the risk of dementia for older adults with diabetes. The risk score was developed using information about nearly 30,000 people. All of them were age 60 or older and had type 2 diabetes. During a 10-year period, about 17% developed dementia. Researchers found that age, education level and six health problems were the strongest predictors of dementia. The problems included diabetic foot or eye disease and events of dangerously high or low blood sugar. These are all directly caused by diabetes. Most of the other conditions also are more common among diabetics. They included heart disease, depression, and stroke or related problems with circulation in the brain. Each risk factor was assigned a point total. Then researchers created a scoring system.