Alzheimer disease: Mechanism and treatments

Alzheimer's disease, AD, has been a difficult problem for relevant experts and patients since its discovery. As a neurodegenerative disease, it can lead to cognitive decline and seriously affect the patient's life. In recent years, with the aging of the world's population, and the combination of various factors, the prevalence of Alzheimer's disease worldwide has been increasing, causing widespread concern in society. The pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease is complex, which is one of the reasons why it is difficult to find an effective treatment until now. Extracellular plaques and intracellular tangles are more important causes of disease. They block communication between nerve cells and cause the death of nerve cells. It makes the patient's brain atrophy, neuroplasticity decline, and ultimately more severe cognitive decline. Most of the current treatments for Alzheimer's disease point to the formation path of plaques and tangles. There are also monoclonal antibody drugs that are more directly directed against plaques. However, almost all of these drugs have disadvantages such as insufficient efficacy or more serious side effects. Most of the drugs used to treat AD can only relieve pathological processes such as cognitive decline in patients, and there is a lack of treatment for patients with more severe symptoms. Most of the current research has been carried out from both pathogenesis and drug development. This article will also review the progress of AD and related research from these two aspects, respectively.