Arthritis drug offers new hope for treating Alzheimer’s disease

A drug that belongs to the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug (NSAIDs) class of medicines and is used to treat rheumatoid arthritis, may effectively reverse elements of Alzheimer’s disease, a research team claims in Nature Medicine.
A study was conducted in mice with clumps of tau in their brains. Tau is a protein that is known to cause toxicity and contribute to cognitive degeneration.

Salsalate was given to the mice and was found to block the process that can lead to a further build-up of tau. Not only did it lower tau levels in the brain, but it rescued memory impairments and protected against the wasting away of the hippocampus, the area of the brain that is essential for memory formation, which is impacted by dementia.

The findings do show promise, but the studies were done on mice, not humans, and only for a couple of months. So human studies are required to see how effective the drug is. But because this drug has already been approved for use in humans, these tests may come sooner rather than later.

“We identified for the first time a pharmacological approach that reverses all aspects of tau toxicity,” explains Dr Li Gan, who is involved in the work. “Remarkably, the profound protective effects of salsalate were achieved even though it was administered after disease onset, indicating that it may be an effective treatment option.”

Although tau has been a target in dementia research for some time, there are no tau-targeted drugs available for patients.

Dr Eric Verdin, another member of the team, comments:

“Given that salsalate is a prescription drug with a long-history of a reasonable safety profile, we believe it can have immediate clinical implications.”

Image credit: Lisa Redfern