Paying for Alzheimer’s

I just returned home from Washington, where I was one of 1,000 researchers and scientists who attended the Alzheimer’s Association’s first-ever International Conference on the Prevention of Dementia. It was a remarkable event. The scientific community is very close to finding strategies for delaying the onset of Alzheimer’s disease and reducing its devastating affects.

As a scientist, this is the most exciting time to be in the field of Alzheimer’s research. I am hopeful that research will someday eliminate this dreadful disease.

There is good reason to hope, but for the immediate future, we have enough scientific evidence to conclude that we will soon be able to treat it more effectively and even prevent it or at least significantly lessen its deadly impact. That is good news for the more than 4.5 million people who have the disease and the 19 million family and friends who make big sacrifices everyday to care for them. It is even better news for the estimated 7.7 million people who will have the disease in 25 years, if we don’t do something to prevent it now.

One of the breakthroughs highlighted at the conference involves early detection. Advanced imaging technologies have helped us discover that reductions in sugar metabolism in the brain could be an early indicator of Alzheimer’s. In another study, researchers found that those with low plasma levels of a brain-clogging poison called amyloid were at significantly greater risk of developing Alzheimer’s. Early detection will enable us to intervene before the actual onset of the disease, maybe beginning as much as 10 years before any symptoms appear. If we can detect the disease earlier, we can begin our interventions sooner and enable those with the disease to live fuller, more independent lives for a longer period of time.

Other research talked about at the conference is well on its way to finding medicines that could purge the brain of amyloid, thereby preventing the memory loss and, ultimately, the fatal ravages of Alzheimer’s.

We saw increased validation of the potential for managing lifestyle factors which could lead to actual prevention of the disease. New discoveries were presented on the possible role of drinking fruit and vegetable juices and consuming high dosages of folic acid. Eating a brain-healthy diet rich in antioxidants found in dark fruits and vegetables, exercising and remaining mentally and socially engaged, watching your cholesterol among other things — may reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s.

The promise of this scientific research cannot be realized, however, unless the federal government provides more funding for the clinical trials and technology needed to confirm all the initial research results and actually get the science into the national health-care system.

That sounds like another of the myriad pitches for more federal spending that people in Washington must hear all of the time. But there are three powerful reasons to actually increase spending for Alzheimer’s research:

• The first is that spending a little money now saves a lot of money later, as was pointed out in “Fighting Alzheimer’s, saving tax dollars,” a June 16 editorial in The Washington Times. This is truly a ’pay now, or pay later’ dilemma. Delaying the onset of Alzheimer’s could, within five years, save Medicaid $10 billion annually, the same amount that Congress is currently trying to wrench out of Medicaid programs over five years. It could save the Medicare program $51 billion a year.

Alzheimer’s is unique. It costs taxpayers three times as much to treat an Alzheimer’s patient as any other patient under Medicare. Preventing Alzheimer’s is simply good health-care economics. An investment of millions will save the government billions.

• The second reason is that if we don’t stop this disease, the federal health-care system may be crushed in its path. The aging of the boomer generation will add tens of millions of people who will be living longer and joining the ranks of Alzheimer’s patients. Our health-care system, in its current state, will not be able to care for them.

• The third reason is one of simple human compassion. I see personally the devastation of this disease, not only on patients, but on their friends and family members who have to deal with the gradual progression and the financial, emotional and social toll it takes on all of them. If we can do something to ease that burden, then we should. It is as simple as that.

I hope Congress will respond.

Dr. Sam Gandy is director of the Farber Institute for Neurosciences at Thomas Jefferson University. He is a professor of neurology, psychiatry and biochemistry and molecular pharmacology at Jefferson Medical College, and chairman of the Alzheimer Association’s National Medical and Scientific Advisory Council.