People with blood type ‘O’ are protected against Alzheimer’s

A recent study has revealed that blood type may determine Alzheimer’s risk in individuals. Among all the blood groups people with an 'O' blood type have more grey matter in their brain, which helps to protect against diseases such as Alzheimer's. The study was published in The Brain Research Bulletin.

The researchers Matteo De Marco and Professor Annalena Venneri, from the University's Department of Neuroscience, made the discovery after analysing the results of 189 Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scans from healthy volunteers. They calculated the volumes of grey matter within the brain and explored differences between different blood groups.

The researchers compared the individuals with ‘O’ blood group with those with ‘A’, ‘B’ or ‘AB’ blood types. They analysed that individuals with an 'O' blood type have more grey matter in the posterior proportion of the cerebellum and 'A', 'B' or 'AB' blood types had smaller grey matter volumes in temporal and limbic regions of the brain, including the left hippocampus, which is one of the earliest part of the brain damaged by Alzheimer's disease. These findings indicate that smaller volumes of grey matter are associated with non-'O' blood types.

"The findings seem to indicate that people who have an 'O' blood type are more protected against the diseases in which volumetric reduction is seen in temporal and mediotemporal regions of the brain like with Alzheimer's disease for instance," said De Marco.

By Lizitha