Alzheimer's disease is a not-so-friendly condition, it is a progressive and developing neurodegenerative disease with an insidious onset, in other words, the cause of the disease is not yet known, and speculation is that it is related to genetic and environmental factors.

Twenty years ago, Alzheimer's was a rare disease of legend. But in those long decades, while we have discovered antibiotics, eradicated many infectious diseases, found cures for certain cancers, and developed a vaccine with the promise of preventing AIDS ......

But for Alzheimer's disease, until last year, what could be done was still not much different from what was done decades ago.


On a positive note, a new study by scientists at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) Center for Memory and Aging shows that brain imaging of pathological tau protein tangles can reliably predict where Alzheimer's patients will experience brain shrinkage in the next year or sooner, according to a study published in Science Translational Medicine on 2 January. earlier the location of brain atrophy.

The results increase the research team's hope that drugs targeting tau, which are currently being investigated at the UCSF Center for Memory and Aging and other institutions, may provide clinical benefits to patients by blocking a key driver of neurodegeneration in this disease.

In the meantime, researchers say that the ability to use PET of tau to predict later brain degeneration could enable more personalised dementia care and speed up ongoing clinical trials.

It also means that PET for tau could be an extremely valuable precision medicine tool for future clinical trials. Its ability to sensitively track tau accumulation in patients will allow clinical researchers to find treatments that slow or even prevent specific patterns of brain atrophy for each patient.

Alzheimer's patients, there may be a cure!

In fact, as stated in our previous articles, the currently available treatments for Alzheimer's disease actually include the use of cannabis medication.


While Alzheimer's disease cannot be cured, it can be treated.

Currently, most doctors use some form of cholinesterase inhibitor (a drug that stops certain enzymes from breaking down chemicals used by nerve cells to communicate inside the brain), but these drugs can have serious side effects and may interact with other medications in unpredictable ways. In some cases, side effects such as nausea and insomnia can reduce a patient's quality of life.However, cannabis compounds can be effective in treating nausea and insomnia, and the evidence also suggests that the use of cannabis has a greater potential for treating Alzheimer's disease.

Recently, dementia researchers from University College London conducted a study on Alzheimer's disease, and according to the findings: one of the key hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease is the build-up of clumps of a protein called amyloid in the brain, and components of marijuana, including CBD (Cannabidiol) & THC (Tetrahydrocannabinol), appear to remove this protein from lab-cultured nerve cells.

In 2018, another report published in Neuroscience showed that mice suffering from Alzheimer's disease symptoms were provided with THC and CBD oils, and after a period of time, the mice's learning ability was improved and amyloid clusters in the body were significantly reduced.

In fact, CBD can help alleviate and improve many dementia-related conditions, including: Alzheimer's disease, vascular dementia, dementia with Lewy bodies (DLB), Parkinson's disease, frontotemporal dementia and Huntington's disease.

According to researchers at the Salk Institute in California, their 2017 study found that cannabinoids such as CBD can help clear dementia from brain cells.

Importantly, the study above was not conducted with human participants. However, small clinical studies conducted with human participants have also shown promising results.

Several organisations around the world are currently preparing for the next step in the study, the results of which will provide a clearer explanation of how cannabinoid compounds affect the onset and progression of Alzheimer's disease in humans.

King's College London has also conducted clinical research into the effects of THC and CBD on people with dementia. The study focused specifically on reducing symptoms such as agitation and aggression in people with dementia, and the lead researcher of the study hopes to prove that oral cannabis medication is an alternative to antipsychotic drugs.

These and future clinical studies may reveal which cannabis compounds are most effective in treating dementia, allowing for the development of more effective medicines to treat Alzheimer's.

Cherish the beautiful memories and warm moments. Protecting our elders and preserving their precious memories is a choice we must make without delay.