Unexplained weight loss in older people might be an early signal of Alzheimer’s disease, appearing several years before the memory lapses that define the illness, according to an intriguing but unproven new theory. Researchers at Chicago’s Rush University Medical Center base the theory on their study of 820 Roman Catholic priests, nuns and brothers aged 75 on average who were followed for up to 10 years.Otherwise healthy participants whose body-mass index fell the most were the most likely to develop Alzheimer’s disease.Study co-author Dr. David Bennett, director of the Rush Alzheimer’s Disease Center, says the results raise the possibility that the disease attacks brain regions involved in regulating food intake and metabolism, as well as memory, and that weight loss is an early symptom.Weight loss frequently occurs after an Alzheimer’s diagnosis and has been attributed partly to memory lapses or lifestyle changes associated with becoming infirm. But it might be that brain changes that start well before diagnosis are another reason, Bennett said.The results appear in the Sept. 27 edition of the journal Neurology.
