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Austin Health is one of five sites across Australia participating in research aimed at preventing Alzheimer’s disease.

Medical director of aged and residential care Associate Professor Michael Woodward said the Scarlet Road study was the first trial of its kind.

“We are looking at how to stop the progression of Alzheimer’s in people already suffering significant memory problems. We have conducted research trials with patients who already have Alzheimer’s but we’ve not done any trials with patients who are at this earlier stage,” Associate Professor Woodward said.

Prodromal Alzheimer’s is a condition characterised by rates of memory loss exceeding that expected in normal ageing.

People with prodromal Alzheimer’s are more likely to develop dementia than people with other forms of memory loss or mild cognitive impairment.

“Memory problems will occur most days in people with the disease and it might impact a person’s ability to plan or pay attention or recall events from the past,” Associate Professor Woodward said.

Researchers know changes occur in the brain many decades before a person develops the symptoms of Alzheimer’s and the process starts with a build up of the protein amyloid in the brain.

Associate Professor Woodward said conducting the research at an early stage was crucial.   ”We can see with PET scans that amyloid is building up 20 years before symptoms. This build up is then associated with damage to brain tissue.”

Researchers hope they will be able to halt this process with the drug gantenerumab.

“We are looking to see if the drug will bind to small aggregates of amyloid, neutralise it and allow it to be cleared from the brain by the body’s immune mechanisms,” Associate Professor Woodward said.

“We know if we wait until the person has dementia, the damage is already done and benefits may be less. So, if we can remove this amyloid, we’ve got a good chance, perhaps our best yet, of stopping the progression to dementia.”

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