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Plasma tau in Alzheimer disease

Mattsson, Niklas LU orcid ; Zetterberg, Henrik LU ; Janelidze, Shorena LU ; Insel, Philip S. LU ; Andreasson, Ulf ; Stomrud, Erik LU orcid ; Palmqvist, Sebastian LU orcid ; Baker, David ; Tan Hehir, Cristina A. and Jeromin, Andreas , et al. (2016) In Neurology 87(17). p.1827-1835
Abstract

Objective: To test whether plasma tau is altered in Alzheimer disease (AD) and whether it is related to changes in cognition, CSF biomarkers of AD pathology (including β-amyloid [Aβ] and tau), brain atrophy, and brain metabolism. Methods: This was a study of plasma tau in prospectively followed patients with AD (n 179), patients with mild cognitive impairment (n 195), and cognitive healthy controls (n 189) from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and cross-sectionally studied patients with AD (n 61), mild cognitive impairment (n 212), and subjective cognitive decline (n 174) and controls (n 274) from the Biomarkers for Identifying Neurodegenerative Disorders Early and Reliably (BioFINDER) study at Lund University,... (More)

Objective: To test whether plasma tau is altered in Alzheimer disease (AD) and whether it is related to changes in cognition, CSF biomarkers of AD pathology (including β-amyloid [Aβ] and tau), brain atrophy, and brain metabolism. Methods: This was a study of plasma tau in prospectively followed patients with AD (n 179), patients with mild cognitive impairment (n 195), and cognitive healthy controls (n 189) from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and cross-sectionally studied patients with AD (n 61), mild cognitive impairment (n 212), and subjective cognitive decline (n 174) and controls (n 274) from the Biomarkers for Identifying Neurodegenerative Disorders Early and Reliably (BioFINDER) study at Lund University, Sweden. A total of 1284 participants were studied. Associations were tested between plasma tau and diagnosis, CSF biomarkers, MRI measures, 18 fluorodeoxyglucose-PET, and cognition. Results: Higher plasma tau was associated with AD dementia, higher CSF tau, and lower CSF Aβ 42, but the correlations were weak and differed between ADNI and BioFINDER. Longitudinal analysis in ADNI showed significant associations between plasma tau and worse cognition, more atrophy, and more hypometabolism during follow-up. Conclusions: Plasma tau partly reflects AD pathology, but the overlap between normal aging and AD is large, especially in patients without dementia. Despite group-level differences, these results do not support plasma tau as an AD biomarker in individual people. Future studies may test longitudinal plasma tau measurements in AD.

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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
in
Neurology
volume
87
issue
17
pages
9 pages
publisher
Lippincott Williams & Wilkins
external identifiers
  • scopus:84992386036
  • pmid:27694257
  • wos:000392231800022
ISSN
0028-3878
DOI
10.1212/WNL.0000000000003246
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
a6dc3a41-7a70-42fd-9d76-95ac5e23daa2
date added to LUP
2016-11-09 07:29:01
date last changed
2024-04-19 13:00:25
@article{a6dc3a41-7a70-42fd-9d76-95ac5e23daa2,
  abstract     = {{<p>Objective: To test whether plasma tau is altered in Alzheimer disease (AD) and whether it is related to changes in cognition, CSF biomarkers of AD pathology (including β-amyloid [Aβ] and tau), brain atrophy, and brain metabolism. Methods: This was a study of plasma tau in prospectively followed patients with AD (n 179), patients with mild cognitive impairment (n 195), and cognitive healthy controls (n 189) from the Alzheimer's Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) and cross-sectionally studied patients with AD (n 61), mild cognitive impairment (n 212), and subjective cognitive decline (n 174) and controls (n 274) from the Biomarkers for Identifying Neurodegenerative Disorders Early and Reliably (BioFINDER) study at Lund University, Sweden. A total of 1284 participants were studied. Associations were tested between plasma tau and diagnosis, CSF biomarkers, MRI measures, 18 fluorodeoxyglucose-PET, and cognition. Results: Higher plasma tau was associated with AD dementia, higher CSF tau, and lower CSF Aβ 42, but the correlations were weak and differed between ADNI and BioFINDER. Longitudinal analysis in ADNI showed significant associations between plasma tau and worse cognition, more atrophy, and more hypometabolism during follow-up. Conclusions: Plasma tau partly reflects AD pathology, but the overlap between normal aging and AD is large, especially in patients without dementia. Despite group-level differences, these results do not support plasma tau as an AD biomarker in individual people. Future studies may test longitudinal plasma tau measurements in AD.</p>}},
  author       = {{Mattsson, Niklas and Zetterberg, Henrik and Janelidze, Shorena and Insel, Philip S. and Andreasson, Ulf and Stomrud, Erik and Palmqvist, Sebastian and Baker, David and Tan Hehir, Cristina A. and Jeromin, Andreas and Hanlon, David and Song, Linan and Shaw, Leslie M. and Trojanowski, John Q. and Weiner, Michael W. and Hansson, Oskar and Blennow, Kaj}},
  issn         = {{0028-3878}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  month        = {{10}},
  number       = {{17}},
  pages        = {{1827--1835}},
  publisher    = {{Lippincott Williams & Wilkins}},
  series       = {{Neurology}},
  title        = {{Plasma tau in Alzheimer disease}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1212/WNL.0000000000003246}},
  doi          = {{10.1212/WNL.0000000000003246}},
  volume       = {{87}},
  year         = {{2016}},
}