There is a connection between AD (Alzheimer’s disease) and inflammation. There is enough evidence to show that the risk of having AD is greatly increased by the inflammation, as a chronically activated immune system will attack not only the pathogens, but also the own body cells. A mild inflammatory state, if it is chronic, may increase the risk for cardiovasculad disease (CD), cancer, AD and it will accelerate the ageing process. Not very helpful, isn’t it?
The main damaging agents are infections produced by viruses, bacteria or fungi, AGE products (advanced glycaetion end products — we talked about them in this previous post), free radicals, damaged lipides or/and proteins (oxidized low-density lipoproteins — LDL), trauma (broken bones, strains, bruises, cuts) and few more others.
How do we measure inflammation?
- C-reactive protein — produced in the liver in response to any kind of inflammation, can bring additional trouble if it is high sensitive (the test that you want is hs-CRP — high sensivity C-reactive proteine, as the standard CRP test is not able to distinguish between optimal and mild high). If the hs-CRP is higher than 0.9mg/l, you need to find the inflammation source. You may have your choice (trans fats, overdosing of sugar and other simple carbohydrates, gluten sensitivity, leaky gut, poor oral hygiene, mycotoxins such as mold and few more others). Once you deal with the problem, you check hs-CRP to see if it is under 0.9 mg/l.
- the Omega-6/Omega-3 ratio in the blood stream should ideally be in between 0.5 and 3. More than 3 is bad, as Omega-6 is inflammatory, under 0.5 increases the risk of hemorrage.
- A/G ratio (the albumin to globulin ratio) is another inflammation measurement, and ideally should be higher than 1.8.
- TNF-alpha (tumor necrosis factor) and IL-6 (interleukin) are two members of the cytokines family, which may reach higher levels in the type 1 AD (inflammatory type). Normal values are under 3 pg/ml for IL-6 and under 6 pg/ml for TNF-alpha.
Next post will be about the link between Alzheimer and vitamin D.
Published in this series about Alzheimer disease early detection:
How to (not) lose your mind — a (not so) original approach on Alzheimer’s disease (1)
Alzheimer’s disease and vitamin B group optimal levels (2)
The homocysteine blood test, hippocampus atrophy and cognitive decline (3)
Alzheimer’s disease and the insulin resistance (4)
All the best,
George
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