A new research consortium has found not only that brain fungi or bacteria can cause some dementia cases, but also that for some patients, the damage can even be reversed.
One of the main drivers behind this discovery, pharmaceutical rep-turned-researcher Nikki Schultek told the Guardian that she started to experience a debilitating range of symptoms during her early 30s, ranging from cognitive issues to a heart arrhythmia.
After being tested for multiple sclerosis and receiving a variety of medical scans, the young mother and her doctors eventually figured out what was going on: she had concurring chronic infections, including from the Lyme disease-causing bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi, which had reached her brain. (Antibiotics calmed the infection, but because it's hard to eradicate infections once they reach the brain, she may continue to need ongoing treatment.)
The harrowing experience inspired Schultek to start a research group — the Alzheimer's Pathobiome Initiative — to study whether cases of dementia and cognitive impairment could be linked to bacterial or fungal infections.
Unlike Schultek, who got a marketing degree from Villanova, the consortium's other members hold medical degrees from universities like Cambridge and Heidelberg, and work at institutions like Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and Oxford's Institute of Population Ageing.
In a paper published in the journal Alzheimer's and Dementia last year, Schultek and her colleagues identified a long list of cases in which patients with dementia symptoms were found to be suffering from brain infections. When they took antiviral or antifungal meds, tantalizingly, those symptoms often abated.
University of Edinburgh molecular biologist and paper coauthor Richard Lathe told the Guardian that many of the patients whose cases the consortium studied discovered the link by accident when their dementia symptoms "went away" after being treated with antivirals or antifungals.
Because the hypothesis runs so counter to the prevailing medical understanding of dementia, it's impossible to know yet what percentage of dementia and Alzheimer's patients may be experiencing those symptoms due to bacterial or fungal infections.
"We know there are some," Lathe told the paper. "We know it’s unlikely to be 100 percent, but our guess is that probably half or more could potentially be treated."
If the theory is borne out by additional research, it could mean that many cases of dementia are reversible with medication — which would utterly change the game when it comes to these debilitating cognitive disorders.
Updated to correct numerous errors, including that Schultek had been suffering from dementia.
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