Alzheimer’s disease may begin its biological progression far earlier than symptoms suggest, with subtle shifts in brain and blood markers emerging decades in advance.
Scientists are uncovering a hidden phase of Alzheimer’s disease that may begin far earlier than most people realize. Long before memory loss becomes noticeable, subtle biological changes could already be underway potentially starting in a person’s late 50s, according to new research from Mayo Clinic.
The study, published in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association, tracks when key changes in the brain and blood begin to speed up over a person’s lifetime. The findings offer clues about the most effective timing for detection and prevention efforts.
Alzheimer’s disease is the most common type of dementia and affects about 6.9 million Americans age 65 and older. It is marked by abnormal buildup of proteins such as amyloid and tau, which can develop years before symptoms and are linked to cognitive decline. There is currently no cure.
Researchers at Mayo Clinic set out to determine when these biological shifts tend to occur. Identifying them earlier could give patients and families more time to plan, seek care, and take advantage of treatments that may slow disease progression.
The team analyzed data from 2,082 participants in the long-running Mayo Clinic Study of Aging. They examined multiple measures, including blood biomarkers, brain scans, and cognitive performance, to pinpoint when Alzheimer’s-related changes begin to accelerate.
“This population-based study provides an integrated view of age-related patterns across multiple Alzheimer’s biomarkers measured in blood and imaging, plus cognition,” says Mingzhao Hu, Ph.D., assistant professor in Mayo Clinic’s Department of Quantitative Health Sciences and first author of the study. “By estimating the ages when changes in health markers become more noticeable, the results show that many of these shifts tend to happen from late 50s through early 70s.”
