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Study: almost half of Alzheimer?s cases are due to hyperinsulinemia

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  • Study: almost half of Alzheimer?s cases are due to hyperinsulinemia

    11-10-16

    SCIENTISTS have long known that there is a strong association between diabetes and Alzheimer?s, but the nature of that relationship - and how to treat it - was unclear. Now
    Melissa Schilling, an innovation professor at NYU, has discovered the pathway between diabetes and Alzheimer?s, and it has big implications for how Alzheimer?s can be prevented.

    Professor Schilling compared and integrated decades of research on diabetes, Alzheimer?s, and molecular chemistry, focusing in particular on results that seemed to yield conflicting results. It turns out that routine practices in research - like excluding all patients with known medical problems such as diabetes from an Alzheimer?s study, for example - had obscured the mechanisms that connect the two diseases. Those main mechanisms turn out to be insulin and the enzymes that break it down. The same enzymes that break down insulin also break down amyloid-beta, the protein that forms tangles and plaques in the brains of people with Alzheimer?s. When people have hyperinsulinemia (i.e., they secrete too much insulin due to a poor diet, pre-diabetes, early diabetes, obesity, etc.) the enzymes are too busy breaking down insulin to break down amyloid-beta, causing amyloid-beta to accumulate.
    The American Diabetes Association estimates that roughly 8.1 million Americans have undiagnosed diabetes and 86 million have pre-diabetes and have no idea. The good news is that hyperinsulinemia is preventable and treatable through changes in diet, exercise, and medication. Schilling notes, ?If we can raise awareness and get more people tested and treated for hyperinsulinemia, we could significantly reduce the incidence of Alzheimer?s disease, as well as other diabetes-related health problems. Everyone should be tested, early and often, preferably with the A1C test that doesn?t require fasting. Dementia patients should especially be tested - some studies have shown that treating the underlying hyperinsulinemia can slow or even reverse Alzheimer?s.?
    Professor Schilling?s research has been published in Journal of Alzheimer?s Disease.
    ?Addressing chronic disease is an issue of human rights ? that must be our call to arms"
    Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief The Lancet

    ~~~~ Twitter:@GertvanderHoek ~~~ GertvanderHoek@gmail.com ~~~

  • #2
    Unraveling Alzheimer’s: Making Sense of the Relationship between Diabetes and Alzheimer’s Disease

    J Alzheimers Dis. 2016; 51(4): 961–977.
    Published online 2016 Apr 12. Prepublished online 2016 Feb 27. doi: 10.3233/JAD-150980



    Abstract

    Numerous studies have documented a strong association between diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The nature of the relationship, however, has remained a puzzle, in part because of seemingly incongruent findings. For example, some studies have concluded that insulin deficiency is primarily at fault, suggesting that intranasal insulin or inhibiting the insulin-degrading enzyme (IDE) could be beneficial.

    Other research has concluded that hyperinsulinemia is to blame, which implies that intranasal insulin or the inhibition of IDE would exacerbate the disease. Such antithetical conclusions pose a serious obstacle to making progress on treatments. However, careful integration of multiple strands of research, with attention to the methods used in different studies, makes it possible to disentangle the research on AD. This integration suggests that there is an important relationship between insulin, IDE, and AD that yields multiple pathways to AD depending on the where deficiency or excess in the cycle occurs.

    I review evidence for each of these pathways here. The results suggest that avoiding excess insulin, and supporting robust IDE levels, could be important ways of preventing and lessening the impact of AD. I also describe what further tests need to be conducted to verify the arguments made in the paper, and their implications for treating AD.



    LINK TO FULL ARTICLE
    Numerous studies have documented a strong association between diabetes and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The nature of the relationship, however, has remained a puzzle, in part because of seemingly incongruent findings. For example, some studies have ...
    ?Addressing chronic disease is an issue of human rights ? that must be our call to arms"
    Richard Horton, Editor-in-Chief The Lancet

    ~~~~ Twitter:@GertvanderHoek ~~~ GertvanderHoek@gmail.com ~~~

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