Alzheimer's first signs may appear in your eyes, study finds

Key Facts

If doctors are able to identify the disease in its earliest stages, people could then make healthy lifestyle choices and control their “modifiable risk factors, like high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes,” Isaacson said, Just how early can we see signs of cognitive decline?
“Our study is the first to provide in-depth analyses of the protein profiles and the molecular, cellular, and structural effects of Alzheimer’s disease in the human retina and how they correspond with changes in the brain and cognitive function,” said senior author Maya Koronyo-Hamaoui, a professor of neurosurgery and biomedical sciences at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles, in a statement.
Investigators in the study collected retinal and brain tissue samples over 14 years from 86 human donors with Alzheimer’s disease and mild cognitive impairment — the largest group of retinal samples ever studied, according to the authors.
The study, published in February in the journal Acta Neuropathologica, found significant increases in beta-amyloid, a key marker of Alzheimer’s disease, in people with both Alzheimer’s and early cognitive decline.