The goal is to compile data from various sources to enable earlier diagnosis.
PredictAD, a collaboration aimed at developing diagnostic procedures for patients with Alzheimer’s disease, was formed by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland, GE Healthcare, and a group of research institutions across Europe.
An EU-funded, three-year project, PredictAD will study imaging biomarkers, electrical brain activity measurement, and blood-based markers as well as develop methods for how to combine data from different biomarkers.
Also as part of PredictAD, a selected biomarker set will be used to develop a software that can be used by physicians to assess risk, diagnose, and monitor the progress of Alzheimer’s disease in real clinical conditions using various patient data.
It is hoped that combining multiple sources of information will enable earlier diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease. The scientists also aim to provide crucial information for differentiating between various forms of dementia and for assessing disease severity. Additionally, the group hopes that its efforts will allow for improved detection of disease progression and treatment efficacy monitoring.
“The aim of PredictAD project is to develop an objective indicator to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease at the earliest stage possible,” says Jyrki Lötjönen, scientific coordinator of the project. “This may be possible by combining data from various data sources of patient monitoring, such as neuropsychological tests, medical imaging, electrical brain activity measurements, and analyzing protein and metabolomics levels of blood samples.”
In addition to VTT and GE Healthcare, consortium members inlcude Nextim, University of Kuopio, Imperial College London, Uppsala University, University of Milan, and Rigshospitalet.