Facts about Alzheimer's
- 10
Clinical trials of the drug lecanemab showed a 27 percent slowing of cognitive decline over 18 months in people with early-stage Alzheimer's disease.
- 09
Approximately 6.7 million Americans aged 65 and older were living with Alzheimer's disease in 2023, according to the Alzheimer's Association.
- 08
A German neuropathologist named Alois Alzheimer first identified the disease in 1901 while examining a 51-year-old patient, Auguste Deter.
- 07
Tau tangles, twisted protein filaments inside neurons, spread predictably through the brain in a pattern first described by Alois Alzheimer in 1906 and now mapped across six distinct stages of pathological progression.
- 06
Positron emission tomography scans reveal that Alzheimer's patients show 30-40 percent lower glucose metabolism in the temporal and parietal lobes compared to cognitively normal adults.
- 05
Women account for approximately two-thirds of Alzheimer's disease cases in the United States, partly due to longer female life expectancy and reduced estrogen protection after menopause.
- 04
Cerebrospinal fluid levels of phosphorylated tau protein can be detected 15 years before Alzheimer's disease symptoms manifest clinically.
- 03
Individuals carrying the APOE4 gene variant have up to 15 times higher risk of developing late-onset Alzheimer's disease compared to non-carriers.
- 02
Amyloid-beta plaques, hallmark deposits in Alzheimer's disease, begin accumulating in the brain 10-20 years before cognitive symptoms appear.
- 01
The brain regions most affected by Alzheimer's show a 20-30 percent reduction in volume compared to healthy brains of the same age.