New Anti-Amyloid Therapies - Where we are Wrong and about What do we have to Take Care of

Abstract

The numbers affected by Alzheimer’s and other dementias has accelerated pace of increasing and still has no tendency to decrease. Effects of the current therapies are quite modest. These effects contribute to negative attitude toward anti dementia drugs, delaying in establishing a diagnosis, postponing of beginning of pharmacological therapy or refusal of using therapy and disbelief in success of other measures like: life style changing, adoption to a new life habit or using non pharmacological therapies. The outcome of these attitudes is significantly faster cognitive decline which is reflected in changes in behavior with more severe episodes of maladaptive behavior that require additional use of medications such as: antipsychotics, hypnotics, benzodiazepines, anti-depressants and anxiolytics.

Unfortunately, although non-pharmacological therapies have a real effect in improving the condition of people with dementia, they are not talked about enough. Professional health meetings do not include non-health professionals who do the hard work of improving a patient's condition every day. Also, health professionals do not refer patients to non-pharmacological therapy although there are science researches which prove efficiency. We want to believe that this is because there are few professional institutions that deal with non-pharmacological interventions, but also experts who have the knowledge, skills and tools for that job. National health and social care systems that either do not recognize these services as useful therapies or offer these services under limited conditions certainly contribute to this serious deficiency. This issue also shows the non-harmonious functioning of the health and social sectors, although non-pharmacological interventions has potential to decline fees these systems.

A new generation of AD therapies are passive anti-amyloid immunotherapies that modify the course of the disease. It is expected that only 13% of people with MCI and 17% with mild dementia are eligible for therapy. The task of these products is cleansing the brain from Beta amyloid (Aß) deposits during 18 months. According to the words of producers, therapy allows slowing the decline of executive functions, maintaining social cognition and preserving short-term and working memory. Therapy has side effects which can worse patient health condition.

Here we ask: "Where we go wrong and why proper communication with stakeholders regarding anti-amyloid therapies is important? What after antiamyloid therapy?”