Abstract
Alois Alzheimer originally described the disease that bears his name as a form of premature aging and degeneration of the nervous system (1). Since then, most studies have focused on it as a disease of neurones — most recently, of specific populations of large cholinergic neurones in the nucleus basalis and of larger neurons in association cortex (7, 39). In the last five years, however, a number of reports have appeared of abnormalities in non-neural cells from patients with Alzheimer disease (DAT). These include lymphocytes (32, 33, 35), leukocytes (26), cultured skin fibroblasts (2), and red blood cells (3, 13, 15, 23). Four groups have reported that some patients with Alzheimer’s disease have abnormally high levels of choline in their red cells (3, 13, 15, 23). Values were expressed as a ratio of red blood cell to plasma choline, to allow for dietary variation. We now confirm this finding in a prospective, double-blind study of 118 subjects, and discuss the implications of these and other abnormalities in non-neural tissues for the pathophysiology of neuronal cell damage in Alzheimer’s disease.
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© 1986 Plenum Press, New York
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Blass, J.P., Hanin, I., Barclay, L., Kopp, U., Reding, M.J. (1986). Elevated Red Cell to Plasma Choline Ratios in Alzheimer’s Disease. In: Hanin, I. (eds) Dynamics of Cholinergic Function. Advances in Behavioral Biology, vol 30. Springer, Boston, MA. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-5194-8_25
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-5194-8_25
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