NeuroTalk Support Groups - View Single Post - Could pathogen infection really lead to Alzheimer's (or PD!)

lurkingforacure · 01-23-2017, 03:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jeffreyn

I found this recent article to be very interesting. The focus of the article is on Alzheimer's (in fact it never mentions PD), but what struck me was the possible relevance to PD of much of what was said.

Could pathogen infection really lead to Alzheimer’s?

I've wondered about this myself. But if PD is caused by an infection, why don't we see clusters of PD? Wouldn't people living in the same house, or those treating PWP, the doctors, nurses, caregivers, get it as well?

If PD is caused by a pathogen that isn't infectious in the traditional sense, so it doesn't spread from person to person like a cold, then how does it get in the brain? To test this out, it seems like it would be relatively easy to introduce a pathogen into a mouse brain and see if it lodged in the PD part of the brain. I'm not a scientist, though, so have no idea if that would even be possible.