( JACKSONVILLE Fla. -- Imagine the day ...)A new century of Alzheimer's disease research,Health

JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Imagine the day when a routine visit to the family doctor includes a simple blood test to predict the risk for developing Alzheimer’s disease (AD). If the test returns a worrisome result -- too many sticky brain proteins that might begin to gum up memory and thought in 10 to 15 years -- a person could be offered an aspirin-like pill to keep those proteins in check.

That is the future a visionary team of researchers at Mayo Clinic’s campus in Jacksonville aims to reach.

“It will be very straightforward, like today’s blood cholesterol test to gauge risk of developing heart disease,” says Steve Younkin, M.D., Ph.D., a Mayo Clinic neuroscientist. “If your cholesterol profile is out of whack, treatment with a simple statin drug can reduce that risk. Our goal is to develop a similar kind of testing and treatment to keep the brain in balance.”

Researchers and physicians at Mayo Clinic’s sites in Florida, Minnesota and Arizona are studying various aspects of Alzheimer’s. When combined, the elements provide a comprehensive approach to unraveling the mystery of the disease: from understanding why it develops, to how it can be diagnosed early, treated effectively and, ultimately, prevented.

Much of the basic lab, animal research and drug discovery occurs in Jacksonville. Mayo researchers in Jacksonville, Rochester, Minn., and Scottsdale, Ariz., are studying aging’s effects in thousands of elderly individuals. Researchers want to know how aging changes brain structure, thought processes and blood chemistry, so they can model and predict progression to Alzheimer’s disease.

“Whether it is working with people or doing lab science, we have really tried to focus our research on ways in which we can make a difference in the lives of our patients, both today and tomorrow,” says Todd Golde, M.D., an Alzheimer’s disease researcher who chairs the Department of Neurosciences at Mayo Clinic Jacksonville.

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