Medical professionals are constantly looking for treatments that will halt or even reverse the progression of Alzheimer’s disease, and a new vaccine called E22W42 may be a large step in the right direction. According to GlobeNewswire, Alzamend Neuro has tested this vaccine in mouse models and published the results in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease.
About Alzheimer’s Disease (AD)
Alzheimer’s disease is a progressive disorder that causes the degeneration and death of brain cells. It occurs in stages, with severity increasing as time goes on. In the later stages of the disease, people will experience significant memory loss and be unable to carry out everyday tasks. The major symptom of this condition is memory loss. Other issues that people experience include problems with thinking and reasoning, making judgments and decisions, planning and completing familiar tasks, and more. They will experience changes in personality and behavior. Other complications can also arise from Alzheimer’s, such as aspiration, pneumonia, infections, falls, fractures, bedsores, malnutrition, and dehydration.
Medical professionals believe that Alzheimer’s is caused by a combination of genetic, environmental, and lifestyle factors. What healthcare professionals do know is that brain cells deteriorate and die. They also suspect that plaques and tangles, which are both proteins, play an important role. There are risk factors that may heighten the chances of developing Alzheimer’s disease. Age is a major factor, as people usually develop this condition after 65. If one has a relative that is affected, they are also at a higher risk. Females are also affected at a higher rate than males. Those with past head trauma, poor sleeping patterns, poor exercise patterns, or other unhealthy lifestyle habits have a higher chance of Alzheimer’s disease.
About the Vaccine
There have been a number of attempts to create a vaccine that would slow or stop the progression of Alzheimer’s, none of which have been successful. Alzamend Neuro hopes that their vaccine breaks this trend.
The E22W42 vaccine uses immune cells that have been loaded with modified Amyloid-β in an effort to reduce the accumulation of toxic Amyloid-β in the brain. As many researchers suspect that this buildup is a major driver of Alzheimer’s, they believe that clearing it would stop disease progression.
In order to test this theory, they administered the vaccine to mouse models of AD. Results found that all mice given E22W42 lost their memory at a slower rate than the group of control mice. Vaccinated mice also performed better in a maze test and had higher levels of Amyloid-β antibodies.
The last thing that researchers found notable was the lack of inflammatory side effects. As inflammation in the brain is a major symptom of AD, treatments cannot produce an inflammatory response if they want to be successful. Researchers liken a treatment that could cause inflammation to “pouring gas on a fire.” Fortunately, the study concluded that E22W42 has a low chance of causing these side effects.
Hopefully further development of this vaccine is successful as well, as it could provide a major benefit to those with Alzheimer’s, who already face a severe unmet medical need.
