IBUPROFEN for alzheimer disease?

I WAS TOLD THAT IBUPROFEN (ONE/DAY) IS BEING GIVEN WITH SOME SUCCESS FOR PREVENTATIVE OR BEGINNING ALZHEIMER DISEASE.  DOES ANYONE ELSE KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT THIS?

[OSMD]

It's important to realize that the use of anti-inflammatory agents to treat Alzheimer's disease is based entirely in the theory that the disease is the consequence of an inflammatory process. While some studies claim to indicate success with slowing the onset of the disease, you must realize that the disease is quite variable among patients so comparisons between patients are somewhat subjective. In other words, the measurement associated with forestalling the disease or its progression is problematic.

If you or a loved one have received a diagnosis of early Alzheimer's disease, it's critical to obtain second opinions because there are many diseases and disorders which can mimic the symptoms of Alzheimer's disease and yet, remain more treatable in most instances. For instance vascular dementia presents itself in many ways like Alzheimer's, except that damage to vascular patency causes significant delays in the utilization of newly learned material. By contrast, the actual pathways to storing new information for the Alzheimer's patient have been disrupted or destroyed by amyloid plaque development. There is also a "mixed" variant, wherein both vascular and Alzheimer's dementia are present.

In the case of many elderly patients, the pattern of poor memory and behavioral changes can just as readily be due to clinical depression, a disorder that is quite common in the late middle-age and geriatric population. Definitive testing is always necessary to rule out the presence of depression before making considerations associated with the presence of Alzheimer's disease. In depression, the cause for poor memory is actually due to interference from factors of depression, so the information is not properly stored or retrieved. Lack of attendence to new information can be just as debilitating to an elderly person as the effects of Alzheimer's disease. In fact, depression in the elderly is commonly known as "pseudo-dementia" for a very good reason. Unlike the morbidity and mortality associated with AD, however, depression is very treatable.

Among those already discussed, there are a multitude of other dementia-causing diseases such as progressive supranuclear palsy, parkinson's disease, dementia with lewy bodies, cortical basal degeneration, posterior cortical atrophy, motor neuron disease and many more. It's imperative, moreover critical, to regularly monitor and measure changes in cognition of the affected person because in the world of neurological disease all roads lead to Rome.

In other words, the early onset for most of the diseases mentioned all begin with similar features, excepting only several key symptoms that would more accurately define the disease in one or two cases.  

There are several cholinesterase inhibitors approved for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease and although as mentioned earlier that anti-inflammatories are questionably responsible for early prevention, the anti-inflammatories do possess side-effects that most often appear in the form of GI errosion.

Discuss alternatives with your family doctors and if you believe that you are predisposed to Alzheimer's disease, genetic testing is available with a very important caveat; if the test proves to be positive, the insurance industry will all but close the doors on availablity of a long-term disability policy so great consideration should be given before such testing is undertaken.

best regards,

OWS, MD