1% of dementia patients in NHS receive essential diagnostic tests for new Alzheimer's drugs.

A study warns that the NHS needs to improve screening for new Alzheimer's drugs, as only 1% of dementia patients receive the essential diagnostic tests needed to access groundbreaking treatments. Two breakthrough drugs, donanemab and lecanemab, have been proven to slow Alzheimer's progression, but their effectiveness requires "gold-standard" diagnostic tests, such as PET brain scans or spinal fluid tests, to confirm the presence of toxic proteins in the brain. Currently, these tests are not routinely available on the NHS.