Inhalational Alzheimer's disease: an unrecognized - and treatable - epidemic

Aging (Albany NY). 2016 Feb;8(2):304-13. doi: 10.18632/aging.100896.

Abstract

Alzheimer's disease is one of the most significant healthcare problems today, with a dire need for effective treatment. Identifying subtypes of Alzheimer's disease may aid in the development of therapeutics, and recently three different subtypes have been described: type 1 (inflammatory), type 2 (non-inflammatory or atrophic), and type 3 (cortical). Here I report that type 3 Alzheimer's disease is the result of exposure to specific toxins, and is most commonly inhalational (IAD), a phenotypic manifestation of chronic inflammatory response syndrome (CIRS), due to biotoxins such as mycotoxins. The appropriate recognition of IAD as a potentially important pathogenetic condition in patients with cognitive decline offers the opportunity for successful treatment of a large number of patients whose current prognoses, in the absence of accurate diagnosis, are grave.

Keywords: biomarkers; biotoxins; chronic inflammatory response syndrome; cognition; dementia; mycotoxins; neurodegeneration.

Publication types

  • Case Reports
  • Research Support, N.I.H., Extramural
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Aged
  • Alzheimer Disease / epidemiology
  • Alzheimer Disease / etiology*
  • Environmental Exposure / adverse effects*
  • Environmental Pollution / adverse effects
  • Epidemics
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Inflammation / microbiology
  • Inhalation
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Mycotoxins / adverse effects*

Substances

  • Mycotoxins

Supplementary concepts

  • Alzheimer disease, familial, type 3