2024-01-24 02:54:00
Vascular dementia, new neuroimaging techniques improve patients’ therapeutic prospects
The advanced Magnetic Resonance techniques can play a decisive role in diagnose early the damage hypertension is causing to the brain of a patient, long before the appearance of clinical signs. Conducted by Department of Angiocardioneurology and Translational Medicine ofl’I.R.C.C.S. Neuromed of Pozzilli (IS), this new research also paves the way for a possible therapeutic intervention capable of counteracting brain alterations which, over time, can lead to dementia.
The study, published in scientific journal Hypertensionstarted from observations on some hypertensive patientsin which the Neuromed research team used advanced diagnostic imaging techniques such as a Diffusion tensor (DTI), investigations that led to the identification of microscopic alterations to brain structures.
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These results represented the starting point for a series of research on laboratory animals, again identifying specific brain damage, including structural, microstructural and hemodynamic changes. Among the most significant findings, the study highlighted microstructural damage in the white matter (made up of the fibers that interconnect neurons) and a reduction in cerebral blood flow related to a widespread rarefaction of the cerebral capillaries.
“Our results – says the engineer Lorenzo Carnival, researcher at the Department of AngioCardioNeurology and Translational Medicine of the IRCCS Neuromed – represent a further development in the work that we have been carrying out for many years to shed new light on the way in which hypertension can determine cognitive impairment and contribute to the onset of neurodegenerative diseases . In addition to the known effects of hypertension on other organs, such as the heart and kidneys, for which we have specific tests, the brain also undergoes significant alterations. Today we have the possibility to promptly detect these alterations using advanced imaging techniques. It could represent an important advance in the context of the clinical management of hypertension and in understanding its long-term effects on the brain.”
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But the study went deeper, revealing the pathogenic role of a neuroinflammatory mechanism mediated by CD8+ T lymphocytes producing interferon-γ. This further discovery paves the way for new therapeutic perspectives capable of slowing down the process of cognitive deterioration.
“When here at Neuromed we talk about translational research – comments the professor Giuseppe Lembo, Full Professor of Translational Medical Sciences and Techniques at La Sapienza University of Rome and director of the Department of AngioCardioNeurology and Translational Medicine of the IRCCS Neuromed – we are not referring to a generic collaboration between research and clinical laboratories. This study clearly shows the concreteness of the concept of translationality: patient care stimulates new observations. And we bring these ideas to the laboratory, from which we can expect concrete developments that will return to the patients themselves in the form of new diagnostic techniques and new therapies”.
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