Large Study Confirms Viagra Reduces Risk of Alzheimer’s by More Than 50%

Viagra, that miracle blue pill for many, may have other attributes beyond fighting erectile dysfunction. They discovered that too would be effective in reducing the risk of Alzheimer’s disease.

This is confirmed by a huge investigation, published in the Journal of Alzheimer’s Disease, which analyzed health insurance data and studied the genetic and neurological effects of the drug. sildenafil.

The study, conducted by researchers in the United States, confirms the potential of the drug prevent critical proteins of nerve cells become “entangled in a deadly mess.”

It was already known, from several previous studies, that enzyme blockers called phosphodiesterase (PDE) inhibitors not only have the ability to promote blood flow in the penis, but also could prevent neurodegeneration responsible for dementia.

This potential may not be that surprising, given that PDEs are known to be involved in nervous signaling pathways that influence neuroplasticity.

Previous research in animal models has shown that the PDE inhibitor sildenafil reduces the excessive phosphorylation of “tau” proteins in nerve cells that causes them to form toxic tangles, helping to improve cognitive health and memory.

However, not all the research has been so flattering, and some studies have shown this they were unable to notice any effects at the population level. And although drugs can have an effect on a neurological level, the mechanisms underlying this process are not yet fully understood.

In the new study, the scientists used cell cultures of neurons created from stem cells donated by Alzheimer’s patients to map the metabolic and genetic activity behind the therapeutic effects of sildenafil.

As they explained, after five days of treatment, the neurons grown in the laboratory produced significantly lower levels of tau proteins with excessive concentrations of added phosphorus, confirming the ability of sildenafil to protect brain cells.

While will need further study To identify exactly how these subtle influences may be involved in the pathology underlying Alzheimer’s, understanding the major gene families affected by sildenafil has provided a solid foundation for understanding why it works and perhaps why some brains develop Alzheimer’s in the first place.

The help of Artificial Intelligence

A second feature of the study used artificial intelligence to look for signals that sildenafil was working at a population level. Previous studies have used health insurance data to find that sildenafil can reduce the risk of Alzheimer’s disease by about 60%.

However, these they were based on a single database insurance, potentially omitting variables that might reveal a different conclusion.

“After computationally integrating this large amount of data, It is rewarding to see the effects of sildenafil in human neurons and real-world patient outcomes,” said Feixiong Cheng, a biomedical computer scientist at the Cleveland Clinic and co-author of the study.

“We believe our findings provide the evidence needed for clinical studies examine further the potential efficacy of sildenafil in patients with Alzheimer’s disease,” he concluded.

Source: Scientific Notice