The concentration of CSF tau protein in patients with Alzheimer′s disease

Objective To study the concentrations of CSF tau protein in the patients with Alzheimer′s disease (AD),multiple infarct dementia (MID),other neurological diseases (OND),schizophrenia(S),normal controls(C) and their relations with Apolipoprotein E (APOE) genetype Methods 45 AD,29 MID,37 S,26 OND patients and 12 C were enrolled in this study The tau protein concentration in CSF was determined by the method of enzyme ligand immunosorbent assay (ELISA) and the APOE allele by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) Results The average CSF tau protein concentration in AD patients [(410±244) ng/L] was significantly higher than that in MID [(213±153) ng/L], S[(129±153) ng/L],OND[(100±147) ng/L] or C[(34±93) ng/L ] The tau protein concentrations in AD were 1 9,3 2,4 1,and 11 9 times higher than these respective diseases The sensitivity for the diagnosis of AD was 88 9%,with the specificity of 91 7%,false negative rate of 11 1% and false positive rate of 8 3% There was no significant correlation between the CSF tau protein concentration and age,onset age,course,education or the score of Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) The APOE e 4 frequency in AD was 32 1%,which was significantly higher than that of S (8 7%),and was not correlated to CSF tau protein concentration Conclusions The CSF tau protein concentration of AD may be increased significantly It is indicated that tau protein might be a potential reference for diagnosis of AD