Rapid improvement in verbal fluency and aphasia following perispinal etanercept in Alzheimer's disease.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Recent clinical studies point to rapid and sustained clinical, cognitive, and behavioral improvement in both Alzheimer's disease and primary progressive aphasia following weekly perispinal administration of etanercept, a TNF-alpha inhibitor that acts by blocking the binding of this cytokine to its receptors. This outcome is concordant with recent basic science studies suggesting that TNF-alpha functions in vivo as a gliotransmitter that regulates synaptic function in the brain. We hypothesized that perispinal etanercept had the potential to improve verbal function in Alzheimer's disease, so we included several standarized measures of verbal ability to evaluate language skills in a clinical trial of perispinal etanercept for Alzheimer's disease.

Methods

This was a

SUBMITTER: Tobinick EL 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2500042 | biostudies-literature | 2008 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature