ABSTRACT
Preventive thinking in medicine has an ancient heritage but prevention science, with its empirical research and empirically grounded theories, has developed only in the latter part of the 20th century. The application of preventive thinking to Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is recent, with research still in its infancy at the beginning of the 21st century. The preventability of AD is stirring broad interest among researchers in the field because of the recognition that current approved treatments for AD have symptomatic but not disease-modifying effects. Primary prevention of AD is currently focused on delaying the development of clinical symptoms and their progression to overt dementia rather than on intercepting the initial pathogenic event. Numerous studies have shown an association between dementia risk, low intake of vitamin B12 and folate, and elevated levels of homocysteine. These factors are associated with cognitive decline also in the absence of dementia.
