Saturday Media Quack – The Alzheimer Blood Test

Last week the media went crazy when they spread the news about “a simple blood test” that will tell the tested person if he or she will develop Alzheimer’s in future years. The researcher’s report, in the journal Nature Medicine, is not as optimistic as the media coverage. It seems that first you have to have “mild cognitive impairment” and then take the test to see if you will progress to Alzheimer’s 2-6 years later, in other words, if you have “presymptomatic Alzheimer’s disease”.

Four of the 15 authors of the report come from Satoris Inc, which claims on its website “Finally, a blood test for Alzheimer’s - simple, accurate, early diagnosis”. The company plans to bring two tests to the commercial market - one this diagnostic test for Alzheimer's disease, the second a test for mild cognitive impairment. Work on the second is considerably behind that for the first.

My objection is that the test has received far too much media buzz following this publication. If it’s a success and available (5 years from now) boomers will be pestering their physicians for a test without having a clear idea what to do if they get a positive result. There’s no indication yet whether Alzheimer’s can, indeed, be stopped in its tracks or even genuinely delayed. Sometimes it may be better not to know who’s designated to get what disease . . .