A comparative study of medication profiles from AD, MCI and non-demented patients

A comparative study of medication profiles from AD, MCI and non-demented patients

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Background: The ever-increasing incidence of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and the lack of effective therapeutics to treat the disease are leading to a “silver tsunami”. Current FDA-approved drugs to treat the disease are limited as their benefit is simply momentary relief of the symptoms. Due to the chronic and progressive nature of AD, patients are routinely prescribed multiple non-AD medications to preserve their ability to perform daily activities and to improve their quality of life. However, how those medications affect AD pathology remains unknown. In the present study, we have compared medication profiles of AD (n = 135), mild cognitive declined (MCI; n = 120), and non-demented (n = 259) patients, with an aim to determine the effects of top-ranked drugs on AD pathology.

Methods: Study subjects (≥65 years) were recruited from an academic geriatric practice that is heavily focused on memory disorders. All subjects underwent for the following cognitive assessments: a) Clinical dementia rating scale (CDR), b) MiniMental Status Examination (MMSE), c) logical memory test, d) digit span forward and backward, e) category fluency test, f) ordering test, g) trails A&B, and finally the Geriatric Depression Scale. Individual medication for each subject was listed and they were categorized into major drug classes. Statistical analysis was performed to determine the frequency of each drug in each class.

Results: Eight top-ranked drug classes were categorized from a list of 453 individual medications. Vitamins (30-40%) and anti-inflammatory (∼30%) drugs were the major categories for each cohort. Interestingly, 11% of drugs were proton pump inhibitors in non-demented patients, and this decreased by 8% in MCI, and 5% in AD. We found a reduced (8%) Lipitor prescriptions for AD patients compared MCI (11%) and non-demented (13%) patients. We are investigating the effects of these highly prescribed drugs on β-amyloid production/aggregation, cytotoxicity, plaque load, and tau phosphorylation in vitro and in vivo using cell culture and AD mouse models. Conclusion: While the effects of routinely prescribed drugs on AD pathology are not well known, we found reduced vitamins, proton pump inhibitors, and Lipitor in the medication profiles of AD patients compared to the non-AD population.

Publication Date

12-2023

Keywords

Alzheimer’sdiseas

Disciplines

Cardiology | Translational Medical Research

Comments

The Alzheimer’s Association International Conference, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, July 2023

A comparative study of medication profiles from AD, MCI and non-demented patients

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