title: [Alzheimer disease: from pathogenetic issues to clinical perspectives].
abstract: The aim of this article is a critical review of the main pathogenetic issues debated in Alzheimer disease, with a focus on the clinical perspectives that could derive from. The pertinence of the amyloid cascade hypothesis as a unique and causal explanation of cognitive deterioration is challenged in the light of recent therapeutic failures of clinical trials and increasing role of tau protein in clinical expression. The detection of very early and possibly preclinical stages of the disease emerges as a necessary condition for the efficacy of future amyloid or tau-oriented curative strategies. In this respect, the possibility of finding individual vulnerability markers--in the group of patients with "mild cognitive impairment" or even in cognitively intact subjects--represents a major challenge of the clinical research in this field.
authors.affiliation: Département de psychiatrie, et Faculté de médecine, HUG, Clinique de Belle-ldée, 1225 Chêne-Bourg/Genève.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Costanza
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Bouras
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Kövari
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Giannakopoulos
mesh_terms: D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000235:genetics* / Q000473:pathology*; D023582:Alzheimer Vaccines; D016229:Amyloid beta-Peptides / Q000276:immunology / Q000378:metabolism; D016564:Amyloid beta-Protein Precursor / Q000235:genetics; D006801:Humans; D058225:Plaque, Amyloid / Q000473:pathology; D049268:Positron-Emission Tomography
chemical_list: D023582:Alzheimer Vaccines; D016229:Amyloid beta-Peptides; D016564:Amyloid beta-Protein Precursor