Therapeutic approaches to age-related dementias: rational search for effective drugs

ABSTRACT

Dementia of the Alzheimer's type is a disease associated with age. As the life expectancy of the world population increases, the incidence of dementia is predicted to increase. Currently, very few medications are available that can be used to mitigate the symptoms of the disease. This symptomatic therapy is not optimal and is associated with variable outcomes and side effects. Furthermore, none of these drugs have been clearly proven to stop or prevent the development of the disease. To begin to seriously address the current poor situation of pharmacotherapeutic management of these devastating diseases, more research is required to understand the pathological changes associated with dementia and to rationally design, synthesize and test compounds with potential for more efficacy and fewer side effects and possibly, disease modifying actions. The ideal compounds would be those which, in addition to providing symptomatic relief, also slow down disease progression with minimal side effects