Title:Frailty Among Alzheimer’s Disease Patients
VOLUME: 12 ISSUE: 4
Author(s):Giacomo Koch, Lorena Belli, Temistocle Lo Giudice, Francesco Di Lorenzo, Giulia Maria Sancesario, Roberto Sorge, Sergio Bernardini and Alessandro Martorana
Affiliation:Department of Neuroscience, University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, 1 Montpellier Street-00133-Rome, Italy.
Keywords:Alzheimer’s disease, frailty, tau protein, amyloid-β42, mini mental state examination.
Abstract:Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is strictly connected with aging and frailty. Although dementia contributes to frailty,
it is not well established whether AD patients could be per se defined “frail”. At the same time, it is not known whether
among AD patients, which are a heterogeneous group of patients, it is possible to identify a subgroup of frail individuals.
In this work we sought indices useful to identify “the frail AD”. To do this we evaluated disease progression rate and
response to pharmacological treatment (Mini Mental State Examination evaluation), cerebrospinal fluid biomarkers
(amyloid-β42, total-tau and phospho-tau) levels, inflammatory indices (serum c-reactive protein, fibrinogen, D-Dimers) in
a group of patients with a diagnosis of probable AD. Our results describe the clinical profile of patients which could be
considered as non-responders and rapidly progressive AD. In the absence of other indices we conclude that patients with
these features could well be considered “frail” among AD.
