Early detection of Alzheimer is very difficult using traditional methods, as it is based on insensitive screening measures or reports of cognitive problems by patients or their family members. Such blunt screening tools can be very unreliable, which might explain why cognitive decline has traditionally been viewed as occurring later in the disease process.
I’ve just met Ioannis Tarnanas and Adrian Locher at a nice 1st of August brunch. Their startup, Altoida, is the result of over a decade of research into the neuroscience of brain connection pattern changes, and finding neuromotor biomarkers that can diagnose Alzheimer’s disease 5 years prior to onset using smartphones and augmented reality.
I think this resolves one of the key issues with medical diagnosis, especially in the context of aging. With complex age-related ailments like Alzheimers, collecting a regular stream of data points before and after the onset of any symptoms, will enable discovery and verification of occurrence patterns and causal relationships. Quantified tracking using such tools will also allow accurate assessment of the effectivity of treatments to validate the ones that actually work for specific individuals.