Table 2.
The popular vote of all researchers (pro-ACH and non-ACH taken together) toward therapeutic priorities in AD research, tabulated according to participants’ gender. Concerning pharmacological treatments, anti-tau drugs offered more optimism than drug classes inspired by the ACH (anti-Aβ antibodies and/or BACE inhibitors). The top three therapeutic targets at preclinical, prodromal, and established AD were also investigated. Lifestyle interventions were a top-3 therapeutic priority at all stages of AD. Taken as a whole, the data suggest a favorable opinion regarding lifestyle factors and tau protein intervention. Gender differences in therapeutic priority were only significant for preclinical AD, with significantly more males arguing in favor of anti-Aβ strategies at this stage. ‡Fisher’s exact test was used to compare groups for categorical variables
All | Female | Male | p ‡ | |
N = 173 | N = 83 | N = 80 | ||
(49.70%) | (47.90%) | |||
Optimism towards the following drugs | ||||
Anti-tau | 97 (61.01%) | 50 (66.67%) | 40 (53.33%) | 0.133 |
Anti-AB antibodies | 62 (38.99%) | 24 (32.00%) | 33 (44.00%) | 0.178 |
BACE inhibitors | 31 (19.50%) | 15 (20.00%) | 12 (16.00%) | 0.671 |
#1 Therapeutic Priority in preclinical AD | 0.020* | |||
Lifestyle factors (diet, smoking, etc.) | 74 (43.53%) | 39 (46.99%) | 31 (39.74%) | |
Aβ physiology (production, clearance, etc.) | 33 (19.41%) | 10 (12.05%) | 22 (28.21%) | |
Inflammation, Microglia, and Astrocytes | 22 (12.94%) | 10 (12.05%) | 11 (14.10%) | |
#1 Therapeutic Priority in prodromal AD | 0.060 | |||
Lifestyle factors (diet, smoking, etc.) | 49 (31.01%) | 24 (32.00%) | 22 (29.73%) | |
Tau and NFTs | 40 (25.32%) | 22 (29.33%) | 15 (20.27%) | |
Inflammation | 26 (16.46%) | 13 (17.33%) | 11 (14.86%) | |
#1 Therapeutic Priority in established AD | 0.928 | |||
Tau and NFTs | 44 (28.21%) | 19 (25.68%) | 21 (28.38%) | |
Lifestyle factors (diet, smoking, etc.) | 38 (24.36%) | 20 (27.03%) | 17 (22.97%) | |
Inflammation, Microglia, and Astrocytes | 29 (18.59%) | 14 (18.92%) | 13 (17.57%) |