Alzheimer can be inherited from mother
by 
Rama Kant Mishra
August 08, 2008
Rama Kant Mishra
August 08, 2008 People may be at higher risk of mind-robbing condition, the Alzheimer’s disease whose mothers have had it, according to a new study. The link may be a dysfunction in how the brain handles sugar, which could probably be genetic and starts years before symptoms of Alzheimer's appear, researchers say.
As explained by lead researcher Lisa Mosconi, a research assistant professor of psychiatry at the Center for Brain Health at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York City, "Overall, the findings show that their brains are not working properly to start with, and the metabolic impairment gets worse over time"..
Mosconi said, “There is evidence that having a parent affected with Alzheimer's disease increases the risk of developing Alzheimer's disease four- to tenfold, however, we don't know why or how this happens. Our study shows for the first time that individuals with an Alzheimer's disease [-affected] mother may be at increased risk for developing Alzheimer's disease themselves because their brains are not utilizing glucose in an effective way".
The findings were presented at the Alzheimer's Association's International Conference on Alzheimer's disease in Chicago. Mosconi's team opted PET scans to look at glucose metabolism in the brains of 66 healthy individuals. Some of the participants had a family history of Alzheimer's disease, and some did not.
The researchers found that people with whose mother were affected with Alzheimer's had a much faster progressive reduction in the use of glucose in areas of the brain affected by the disease, compared with people who had a father with Alzheimer's or parents without the disease.
Mosconi said, "At this point, we can only speculate that genes that are maternally inherited may alter brain metabolism. We need to follow subjects for longer time periods to ascertain whether the metabolic reductions are in fact forerunning cognitive deterioration".
Tags: Alzeimer's Disease , Genetic , Mother , Alzheimer's , Disease
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