Identification of Pre-Clinical Alzheimer's Disease in a Population of Elderly Cognitively Normal Participants

Abstract

Alzheimer's disease (AD) has a long pathological process, with an approximate lead-time of 20 years. During the early stages of the disease process, little evidence of the building pathology is identifiable without cerebrospinal fluid and/or imaging analyses. Clinical manifestations of AD do not present until irreversible pathological changes have occurred. Given an opportunity to provide treatment prior to irreversible pathological change, this study aims to identify a subgroup of cognitively normal (CN) participants from the Australian Imaging, Biomarker Lifestyle Flagship Study of Ageing (AIBL), where subtle changes in cognition are indicative of early AD-related pathology. Using a Bayesi..