Building a Screening-Intervention Closed-Loop to Fortify Alzheimer's Defenses
"Forgetting what was just said, failing to recognize loved ones one sees every day, gradually losing the ability to live independently..." Alzheimer's disease (AD), a neurodegenerative disease with an insidious onset and progressive development, is silently eroding the cognitive health of tens of millions of elderly people. With an average disease course of 8-10 years, it not only causes patients to gradually lose themselves but also places a heavy burden on families and society. As China's population aging process continues to accelerate, the situation of Alzheimer's disease prevention and treatment is becoming increasingly severe. Building a "screening-intervention" closed-loop management model has become a key path to solving this problem, safeguarding the cognitive health of the elderly population.
Severe Disease Situation, Prevention and Treatment Are Urgent
The deepening of population aging has caused the pressure of Alzheimer's disease prevention and control to continue rising. Data from the "China Alzheimer's Disease Report 2024" shows that China currently has nearly 17 million patients with Alzheimer's disease and other dementias, of which Alzheimer's disease patients account for about 70%, totaling nearly 12 million people. Among the elderly aged 60 and above, the incidence of Alzheimer's disease exceeds 5%, and as age increases, the incidence rate shows a gradual upward trend.
The terrifying aspect of this disease lies in its irreversible progressive nature. After contracting the disease, a patient's cognitive function gradually deteriorates, eventually leading to a complete loss of living ability. The length of the disease course, although related to treatment effectiveness, family care methods, and personal condition, has an overall prognosis that is not optimistic. Among them, the disease progression speed is relatively faster for early-onset, younger patients, while it is relatively slower for older patients. More alarmingly, the early symptoms of Alzheimer's disease are insidious and easily mistaken for "senior moments," causing many patients to miss the best intervention window. By the time of diagnosis, the disease has often progressed to the middle or late stages, significantly reducing treatment effectiveness.
Facing the severe prevention and treatment situation, the state attaches great importance to the development of Alzheimer's disease diagnosis and treatment. Fifteen departments, including the National Health Commission, jointly issued the "National Action Plan for Responding to Senile Dementia (2024-2030)," clearly proposing that by 2030, scientific knowledge on dementia prevention and control will be basically popularized, cognitive function screening for the elderly will be comprehensively carried out, high-risk groups for senile dementia will receive early intervention, and standardized diagnosis and treatment mechanisms will be more perfected. This provides clear policy guidance for advancing "screening-intervention" closed-loop management.
Closed-Loop Management as a Solution, Screening is the Primary Gateway
It is clinically recognized that Alzheimer's disease is "incurable but can be effectively delayed." Screening is the premise for achieving effective intervention and is the first line of defense in the "screening-intervention" closed-loop management. Currently, there is no absolutely effective prevention method for Alzheimer's disease, but through a healthy lifestyle and active screening and intervention, the risk of onset or disease progression can be effectively reduced.
In the screening stage, popularizing early disease knowledge and guiding the elderly to actively participate in screening is crucial. The elderly and their families should pay close attention to early signs, focusing on vigilance against abnormal manifestations such as memory decline, decreased judgment, personality changes, and impaired visuospatial ability. Once related symptoms appear, they should promptly go to medical institutions for examination. Especially for people with a family history or other high-risk factors, regular cognitive function screening should be conducted to achieve early detection and early diagnosis.
Technological progress provides strong support for precise screening. The ADDS Cognitive Dysfunction Screening System, with its innovative technology, has achieved precision and convenience in early Alzheimer's disease screening. The system innovatively combines internationally accepted neuropsychological scales with dynamic electroencephalography (EEG). Through a human-computer interaction mode, it integrates international standard scales and non-invasive EEG feature collection, completing a quantitative assessment of cognitive function in just 10 minutes, with a screening accuracy rate exceeding 90%. It can objectively and accurately achieve early and precise judgment of Alzheimer's disease, winning precious time for early disease intervention. Currently, this system has been widely used in medical institutions across multiple provinces and cities in China, becoming an important tool for primary-level institutions to carry out cognitive function screening, promoting screening work towards scale and standardization.
Precise Intervention Exerts Force, Holding the Key to Delaying the Condition
The core of "screening-intervention" closed-loop management lies in timely connecting scientific and effective intervention measures after screening, achieving "screening yields results, intervention has a plan, and management has follow-up." Only through early intervention can disease progression be maximally alleviated, helping patients maintain cognitive function and self-care ability, and reducing family care pressure.
For the screened population with Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and early-stage Alzheimer's disease patients, personalized intervention devices play an important role. The ADTS Memory Impairment Training Device deeply integrates artificial intelligence and brain-computer interface technology, breaking the limitations of traditional rehabilitation training being passive and monotonous. It uses EEG signals to drive and control the progress of rehabilitation games. Through scientific training modes, it enhances brain focus, complexity, and approximate entropy, effectively activates neural cells in the cerebral cortex, strengthens brain function, provides personalized rehabilitation training plans for patients with memory impairment, and helps patients delay memory decline.
Besides targeted rehabilitation training, intervention through a healthy lifestyle is also indispensable. By guiding the elderly to develop habits of regular routine, balanced diet, and moderate exercise, controlling cardiovascular chronic diseases, while strengthening social interaction and engaging in mental activities, the risk of disease progression can be further reduced. This forms a synergistic effect with device intervention, building a comprehensive early intervention system.
Treatment Methods Upgrade, Perfecting the Closed-Loop Synergistic System
With the continuous deepening of medical research, Alzheimer's disease treatment methods continue to enrich, providing stronger support for the "screening-intervention" closed-loop management. For a long time, Alzheimer's disease has lacked effective causal treatment methods. Its etiology has not yet been fully clarified. The current mainstream theory holds that the deposition of β-amyloid protein and others in the brain to form plaques, damaging neurons, is an important reason leading to abnormal cognitive function and changes in personality and behavior in patients. Many treatment methods also revolve around this mechanism.
The market launch of targeted drugs has brought new breakthroughs for causal treatment. In 2024, the world's first causal targeted drug for Alzheimer's disease, lecanemab, which received full FDA approval, was launched in China. In March 2026, the injection of donanemab was also officially launched in China. This type of causal treatment targeted new drug can effectively delay the progression speed of Alzheimer's disease by clearing amyloid plaques. However, it should be noted that Alzheimer's disease is a progressive disease; amyloid protein will continue to be produced and accumulate after being cleared. Once medication is stopped, pathological reactions may occur. Therefore, single-drug treatment is difficult to achieve ideal results.
Against this background, combining innovative physical therapy with drug treatment has become a more ideal treatment choice. The ADMS Neuromodulation System is a typical example. This system takes into account the mechanism of traditional Chinese medicine in treating Alzheimer's disease. It regulates body balance, improves cerebral microcirculation, and promotes the nutrition and repair of nerve cells. Simultaneously, through combined visual, auditory, and tactile sensory stimulation, paired with dual technologies of head brain region photobiomodulation and extremely low-frequency whole-body magnetic field stimulation, it produces a broader and stronger induction effect of 40Hz gamma oscillations in brain regions, precisely covering dementia-related brain areas such as the hippocampus, insula, and amygdala, effectively improving patients' neurodegenerative lesions and dementia symptoms. Clinical data shows that using this system in synergy with targeted drugs can further enhance treatment effects, reduce drug side effects, and perfect the full-chain closed loop of "screening-intervention-treatment."
Closed-Loop Empowers Prevention and Control, Safeguarding Elderly Cognitive Health
The prevention and treatment of Alzheimer's disease is a long-term and arduous systematic project. The "screening-intervention" closed-loop management breaks the pain points of the traditional prevention and treatment model, where screening and intervention are disconnected, and treatment and rehabilitation are fragmented. It builds a full-chain system of "prevention, screening, diagnosis, treatment, and care," achieving seamless connection from risk prevention and control to disease condition management.
From policy guidance to technological support, from medical institutions to family participation, the advancement of the "screening-intervention" closed-loop management not only enables more elderly people to detect cognitive abnormalities in time and obtain scientific intervention but also promotes the transformation of Alzheimer's disease prevention and treatment work from "passive treatment" to "active prevention and control." In the future, with the continuous improvement of the closed-loop management model, the continuous expansion of screening coverage, the continuous innovation of intervention technologies, and the enhancement of society's overall awareness of Alzheimer's disease, more elderly people are bound to benefit from this model, effectively delaying disease progression, and safeguarding their cognitive health and quality of life in their later years.