ARUP Laboratories now provides a blood test for phosphorylated tau 217 (pTau 217) to assist in identifying whether cognitive decline symptoms in patients ages 60 years and older are related to Alzheimer’s disease (AD) pathology. As this biomarker can be detected in blood, this test is a minimally invasive and broadly accessible diagnostic tool that may facilitate earlier detection of AD.
ARUP validated the pTau 217 test using carefully characterized samples from Eli Lilly and Company’s Phase 3 TRAILBLAZER-ALZ 2 trial. The validation cohort included blood specimens and results from amyloid positron emission tomography (amyloid-PET) imaging of 524 individuals.
„Not only did we have data for the method comparison, but we were also able to reference the PET imaging data, which further increased our confidence in the quality of this test,“ said Sonia La`ulu, MBA, C(ASCP).
Conventional testing of cognitively impaired individuals by evaluation of biomarkers in cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) or by amyloid-PET requires invasive procedures that are difficult to access for many patients. By contrast, plasma biomarkers offer a minimally invasive alternative to detect AD pathology.
