One challenge in developing a treatment for Alzheimer’s lies in that by the time symptoms occur, brain neurons have already been damaged, perhaps beyond repair. Drug treatments that start after people report declines in their thinking skills may simply be too little too late.

That’s why there’s strong interest in developing a reliable way to identify Alzheimer’s patients as early as possible, years or even decades before their memories start to fade. Researchers are investigating a number of promising markers that appear in the blood that could be useful in tracking Alzheimer’s.

Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis report in the journal Neurology that they have developed such a blood test that may be up to 94% accurate in finding people with early Alzheimer’s brain changes.

Read the full article in Time