Another one bites the dust

This week's ALZForum carries the story of another Alzheimer's disease drug trial that was terminated early.  The drug is Lanabecestat, which is a "BACE inhibitor."  The concept behind BACE inhibitors is that they can inhibit the generation of an enzyme that is specified in the BACE1 gene.  The enzyme cuts the "amyloid precursor protein (APP)," and a fragment from the cutting process is beta amyloid.  In AD, the amyloids accumulate on the neurons in the brain and interfere with their function.

What is the purpose of APP? No one knows.  Why does the BACE1 enzyme cut APP molecules?  No one knows.  But suppression of the BACE1 enzyme suggests logically that it could help control AD.

Several BACE inhibitors have been tried, but drug trials have been terminated prematurely because of bad side effects (e.g., liver damage), or they just weren't working.

This is just one more discouragement in a long string of discouragements in AD research.  When I was first diagnosed in 2015, the buzz I was hearing in the science media was that we would have an effective AD drug to market by 2019.  How things have changed.

At this point in time all we have for treating AD is what I explain in Beating the Dementia Monster:

• Get daily aerobic exercise (45 minutes a day, 6 days/week)
• Eat a Mediterranean or similar low-carbohydrate diet that favors leafy green vegetables, fish and poultry, and blueberries and strawberries
• Maintain social activity
• Get good, regular sleep
• Reduce stress (e.g., do Yoga)