Published January 20, 2023 | Version v1
Journal article Open

The Amyloid Imaging for the Prevention of Alzheimer's Disease Consortium: A European collaboration with a global impact

  • 1. Department of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Amsterdam University Medical Center, location VUmc, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Amsterdam Neuroscience, Brain Imaging, Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • 2. GE Healthcare, Amersham, United Kingdom
  • 3. arcelona Beta Brain Research Center, Barcelona, Spain
  • 4. Centre for Medical Image Computing, and Queen Square Institute of Neurology, UCL, London, United Kingdom
  • 5. Laboratory of Neuroimaging of Aging (LANVIE), Université de Genève, Geneva, Switzerland,
  • 6. Synapse Research Management Partners, Barcelona, Spain,
  • 7. Department of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Amsterdam University Medical Center, location VUmc, Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • 8. Department of Neurobiology, Care Sciences and Society, Center of Alzheimer Research, Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden
  • 9. Department of Nuclear Medicine, Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Toulouse, Toulouse, France,
  • 10. ife Molecular Imaging GmbH, Berlin, Baden-Württemberg, Germany,
  • 11. Janssen Pharmaceutica NV, Beerse, Belgium
  • 12. Alzheimer Europe
  • 13. Barcelona Alzheimer Treatment and Research Center Memory Clinic, Fundació ACE, Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain
  • 14. Department of Psychiatry, University Hospital of Cologne, Cologne, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany
  • 15. Faculty of Medicine, University Hospitals Leuven, Leuven, Brussels, Belgium
  • 16. Institute of Neuroscience (IONS), Université Catholique de Louvain, Brussels, Belgium
  • 17. Department of Psychiatry and Neurochemistry, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden
  • 18. Centre for Clinical Brain Sciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, Scotland, United Kingdom
  • 19. Brain Research Center, Amsterdam, Netherlands
  • 20. Department of Radiology and Nuclear Medicine, Amsterdam University Medical Center, location VUmc, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Amsterdam Neuroscience, Brain Imaging, Amsterdam, Netherlands; Centre for Medical Image Computing, and Queen Square Institute of Neurology, UCL, London, United Kingdom

Description

Abstract:

Background: Amyloid-β (Aβ) accumulation is considered the earliest pathological change in Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The Amyloid Imaging to Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease (AMYPAD) consortium is a collaborative European framework across European Federation of Pharmaceutical Industries Associations (EFPIA), academic, and ‘Small and Medium-sized enterprises’ (SME) partners aiming to provide evidence on the clinical utility and cost-effectiveness of Positron Emission Tomography (PET) imaging in diagnostic work-up of AD and to support clinical trial design by developing optimal quantitative methodology in an early AD population. The AMYPAD studies: In the Diagnostic and Patient Management Study (DPMS), 844 participants from eight centres across three clinical subgroups (245 subjective cognitive decline, 342 mild cognitive impairment, and 258 dementia) were included. The Prognostic and Natural History Study (PNHS) recruited pre-dementia subjects across 11 European parent cohorts (PCs). Approximately 1600 unique subjects with historical and prospective data were collected within this study. PET acquisition with [18F]flutemetamol or [18F]florbetaben radiotracers was performed and quantified using the Centiloid (CL) method.


Results: AMYPAD has significantly contributed to the AD field by furthering our understanding of amyloid deposition in the brain and the optimal methodology to measure this process. Main contributions so far include the validation of the dual-time window acquisition protocol to derive the fully quantitative non-displaceable binding potential (BPND), assess the value of this metric in the context of clinical trials, improve PET-sensitivity to emerging Aβ burden and utilize its available regional information, establish the quantitative accuracy of the Centiloid method across tracers and support implementation of quantitative amyloid-PET measures in the clinical routine.

Future steps: The AMYPAD consortium has succeeded in recruiting and following a large number of prospective subjects and setting up a collaborative framework to integrate data across European PCs. Efforts are currently ongoing in collaboration with ARIDHIA and ADDI to harmonize, integrate, and curate all available clinical data from the PNHS PCs, which will become openly accessible to the wider scientific community.

Notes

This project has received funding from the Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint Undertaking under grant agreement No. 115952. This Joint Undertaking receives support from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program and EFPIA. This communication reflects the views of the authors and neither IMI nor the European Union and EFPIA are liable for any use that may be made of the information contained herein.

Files

The amyloid imaging for the prevention of Alzheimer's disease consortium- A European collaboration with global impact.pdf

Additional details

Funding

AMYPAD – Amyloid imaging to Prevent Alzheimer’s Disease – Sofia ref.: 115952 115952
European Commission