Treatments for Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and other forms of dementia may already be in your medicine cabinet

wpc fall medicine cabinet

Tried, true, and FDA-approved drugs for cancer and depression—already in medicine cabinets—may also be long-sought treatments for devastating brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, and other forms of dementia, according to a new study….

The research is still in early stages; it only involved mouse and cell experiments, which are frequently not predictive of how things will go in humans. Nevertheless, the preliminary findings are strong, and scientists are optimistic that the drugs could one day help patients with progressive brain disease. Researchers are moving toward human trials.

In the preliminary tests, the two drugs—trazodone hydrochloride, used to treat depression and anxiety, and dibenzoylmethane (DBM), effective against prostate and breast tumors—could shut down a devastating stress response in brain cells, known to be critical for the progression of brain diseases. The drugs both protected brain cells and restored memory in mice suffering from brain diseases.

“The two drugs were markedly neuroprotective,” the authors conclude. “These drugs therefore represent an important step forward in the pursuit of disease-modifying treatments for Alzheimer’s and related disorders.”

[Read the original source here]

The GLP aggregated and excerpted this blog/article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion, and analysis. Read full, original post: Drugs already in medicine cabinets may fight dementia, early data suggests

For more background on the Genetic Literacy Project, read GLP on Wikipedia

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