Combination of the different biological markers for increasing specificity of in vivo Alzheimer's testing.

In view of existing drugs (acetylcholine esterase inhibitors) and emerging therapeutic compounds (e.g. neuroprotective and anti-inflammatory compounds), CSF markers would be of great use to improve the clinical diagnostic accuracy of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Correct identification of AD would be especially important early in the course of the disease, when the clinical diagnosis is difficult, and drugs have the greatest potential of being effective. Biochemical markers for AD include ApoE genotyping, where the ApoE epsilon 4 allele has proven to have a high predictive value for AD. Biochemical markers for AD also include several potential cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) markers: beta-amyloid(1-42), possibly reflecting amyloid deposition and formation of senile plaques; PHFtau protein a marker for the phosphorylation state of tau, and formation of neurofibrillary tangles; (total)tau protein, a normal axonal protein, as a marker for ongoing neuronal and axonal degeneration; synaptic vesicle proteins, e.g. synaptotagmin, a synaptic vesicle protein which is found in the CSF, as markers for synaptic activity or degeneration; neuromodulin or growth-associated protein GAP-43, as a marker for synaptic degeneration, and the CSF/serum albumin ratio, as a marker for blood-brain barrier damage, used to exclude patients with concomitant cerebrovascular pathology. However, although CSF markers may identify different pathogenic processes in AD, there is no such process that is specific for AD, and thus little hope of ever finding a single CSF biochemical marker that gives an absolute discrimination between AD and other dementia disorders. Instead, combination of several CSF biochemical markers, each reflecting a pathogenic process, may increase both the sensitivity and specificity. Further, the accuracy of the clinical diagnosis of AD may increase if the diagnosis is based on the summarised information gained from the clinical examination, brain-imaging techniques (SPECT, CT/MRT scans), and biochemical markers. Using this approach, CSF markers have a large potential to help to differentiate AD from the most problematic differential diagnoses, especially age-associated memory impairment, depressive pseudo-dementia, Parkinson's disease, and frontal lobe dementia.