Researchers are looking into how treatment for Alzheimer's disease can be administered before Alzheimer's signs are made manifest.

As the New York Times reports, scientists have already established that the formation of Alzheimer's takes place long before signs are exhibited. But if preventive medications could be given early on, it may help prevent the disease from progressing.

"We're trying to go earlier and earlier in the course of the disease," Neil Buckholtz, chief of the Dementias of Aging branch at the National Institute of Aging, told the Times. "The idea is to locate how people move through these stages and what indications there are of each stage."

Several promising projects are in the offing, according to the New York Times. One of them involves 5,000 extended family members in Colombia, most of whom were afflicted with the dementia after inheriting it through a genetic mutation. In addition to its prevalence, the situation is noteworthy because many of those who developed the condition were in their 40s, which is less common.

Researchers are hopeful that they may be able to determine how it compares with more common forms of Alzheimer's, the source notes.