How predictive of dementia are peripheral inflammatory markers in the elderly?

Dementia is a huge public health concern today owing to the exponentially increasing number of older adults it affects each year, and there has been a large number of investigators looking at potential biomarkers of dementia. Peripheral inflammatory markers have emerged as one potential class of markers that may be useful in predicting those individuals at a greater risk of developing dementia, or in expounding the underlying mechanisms or pathways of this complex disease. Although some evidence has been promising, indicating that peripheral inflammatory markers are indeed crucial in brain changes that occur in both normal aging and in dementia, results have been mixed on their usefulness for predicting dementia or cognitive decline in older adults. Here, the authors present a review of existing studies investigating inflammatory markers as potential biomarkers of dementia, highlighting some strengths and limitations of the current research and discuss the future directions for this field.