A team of Chinese researchers has claimed to have discovered the world‘s youngest Alzheimer’s patient. It is a 19-year-old from Beijing who has been diagnosed with the neurodegenerative disease, normally associated with the elderly. The writes it Journal of Alzheimer’s disease.
Early-onset Alzheimer’s disease, which affects people under the age of 65, is considered uncommon, accounting for only 5-10% of all known cases. Almost all patients with Alzheimer’s under 30 have genetic mutations (PS1, PS2, APP) that predispose to the disease. Despite this, the 19-year-old has no case of a genetic mutation related to dementia, making his case unique. It is therefore a form of early Alzheimer’s never seen before.
The first difficulties appeared when the young man was only 17 years old, during his high school years. It got worse a year later when he began to suffer from short-term memory loss. He forgot, for example, what he had done the day before or where he had stored a certain object. He also began to have difficulty reading and slow reactions. His memory gradually diminished: he often lost his things, didn’t remember if he ate or not, couldn’t finish his homework. Eventually he was forced to drop out of high school.
The discovery of the disease
The doctors who followed him, scientists from the National Clinical Research Center for Geriatric Diseases in Beijing, subjected the young man to a standardized test approved by the World Health Organization to evaluate his memory abilities, which were found to be impaired. Later investigations, such as magnetic resonance imaging, have shown bilateral hippocampal atrophy and hypometabolism in the bilateral temporal lobe, both typical signs of Alzheimer’s disease. Additionally, examination of the patient’s cerebrospinal fluid revealed an increased concentration of tau protein, a biomarker of neurodegenerative diseases.
“All the data reported go in the direction of a diagnosis of Alzheimer’s although when there is an early onset there is generally a very clear genetic basis which in this case does not exist” comments Alessandro Padovani, director of the Neurology Clinic at the University of Brescia. “Juvenile-onset cases between the ages of 28-32 are known, and they are all linked to genetic mutations. However, such early cases have never been described, mostly unrelated to family histories or genetic mutations. The story of this boy is striking because there are already clear signs of the disease in an unexpectedly anticipated era”.
“I study – the authors conclude – aims to focus attention on early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Exploring the mysteries of young people with Alzheimer’s disease could become one of the most challenging scientific questions in the future.”