The Future is p-Tau – Anticipating Direct-to Consumer Alzheimer’s Disease Blood Tests

January 4, 2021

Emily Largent, JD, PhD, RN, and Jason Karlawish, MD, leaders of the IMPACT Ethics and Regulation Core, are authors on a publication discussing the future of p-Tau and Alzheimer’s disease blood tests.

Excerpt

Recent studies suggest blood levels of phosphorylated tau (p-Tau) isoforms can detect both the tau and amyloid pathologies that define Alzheimer’s disease (AD).¹ More research is needed to replicate these results in large, diverse cohorts and to quantify a p-Tau blood test’s ability to predict the onset of dementia. Nevertheless, we anticipate that the ability to receive diagnostic and prognostic information with the ease of a blood test will revolutionize research and care. We also anticipate that it will be the basis of a profitable direct-to-consumer (DTC) test, one that highlights significant ethical and social challenges of DTC testing and AD.