TUESDAY, Aug. 12 (HealthDay News) -- PET scans may provide doctors with a non-invasive method of detecting Alzheimer's disease-related brain plaques, Finnish researchers say.

Currently, the only reliable way to assess the presence of such plaques is through analysis of brain tissue samples obtained when a patient is alive or after death. In their study, University of Kuopio researchers examined 10 patients without severe dementia who'd undergone a biopsy of their brain's frontal cortex to check for normal-pressure hydrocephalus, an abnormal increase of cerebrospinal fluid in the brain.

TUESDAY, July 29 (HealthDay News) -- Despite high levels of smoking, Japanese men are far less likely to have dangerous plaque build-up in their blood vessels than white or Japanese-American men, a difference that researchers believe stems from a lifelong, near-daily consumption of fish.

LONDON - Some doctors have long suspected that if the plaque that builds up in the brains of patients with Alzheimer's disease could be removed, they could be saved. But a new vaccine that did just that suggests the theory is wrong.

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