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Nearly 40,000 frozen blood samples collected during one of the largest U.S. studies of high blood pressure may soon reveal new insights into who is most at risk for Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias — and a Phoenix researcher is helping lead the effort.
The National Institutes of Health has awarded a five-year, $21.6 million grant to a team of researchers, including Banner Alzheimer’s Institute, to study how hypertension may contribute to brain disease, according to a press release.
The research will focus on identifying molecules in blood that signal the earliest stages of Alzheimer’s and related dementias.
“This study represents a first-of-its-kind approach and positions Banner Alzheimer’s Institute at the forefront of innovative dementia research,” said Dr. Jeremy Pruzin, behavioral neurologist at Banner Alzheimer’s Institute and a principal investigator on the study. “High blood pressure is one of the biggest modifiable risk factors for dementia, but we still don’t fully understand why. We hope our findings will help identify which patients face the highest dementia risk and guide more personalized approaches to managing blood pressure.”
The research team will analyze blood samples collected during the SPRINT trial, a nationwide study on intensive blood pressure control. The goal is to understand how blood pressure intersects with Alzheimer’s pathology and dementia risk. The team plans to share the resulting data publicly to accelerate discovery.
Alzheimer’s disease is the most common cause of dementia, which disrupts memory and thinking to the point of interfering with daily life. Dementia can also result from vascular issues in the brain. Researchers hope the study will help delay or prevent the disease in future generations.
Dr. Adam Bress, professor of population health sciences at University of Utah Health and investigator at the VA Salt Lake City Healthcare System, is also a principal investigator on the study. He said the project aims to answer several key questions:
•How does lowering blood pressure more intensively affect brain health?
•Does hypertension treatment influence brain health through Alzheimer’s-related pathways, such as protein plaques and tangles, or through vascular mechanisms?
•How does existing Alzheimer’s pathology affect treatment strategies for high blood pressure?
Central to the study is a recently discovered blood biomarker that can detect Alzheimer’s-related brain changes with accuracy comparable to PET scans or cerebrospinal fluid samples. Researchers will cross-reference these biomarkers with health data to assess how treatment effectiveness varies by genetics, demographics and pre-existing conditions.
“This is going to be one of the largest repositories of its kind in the world,” Dr. Bress said. “We’re going to post all the data publicly, including five different blood biomarkers matched with cognitive outcomes and dementia diagnoses.”
