In a total of ten studies involving 1,300 people, those who had used so-called noradrenergic drugs performed slightly but significantly better in Alzheimer’s tests. Results from eight studies with 425 patients also showed that apathy was significantly less common when taking these drugs. The authors of the study, who published their results in the journal “Journal of Neurology Neurosurgery & Psychiatry”, see this as a good basis for conducting further clinical studies with noradrenergic drugs for the treatment of Alzheimer’s.
Noradrenergic drugs influence the effect of the messenger substance norepinephrine, also called norepinephrine. Commonly, these drugs are used for depression, high blood pressure, and ADHD. Released by a network of specialized neurons, norepinephrine is critical to processes such as attention, learning, memory, action, and the suppression of inappropriate behavior. Disturbances in this network appear early in Alzheimer’s disease and contribute to the typical symptoms.
For this reason, the researchers evaluated studies from 1980 to 2021 in which noradrenergic drugs such as atomoxetine, methylphenidate and guanfacine were used. They found a total of 19 eligible studies involving 1811 patients. Six of the studies were rated as qualitatively “good”, seven as “moderate” and six as “poor”.
Which: DOI 10.1136 / jnnp-2022-329136