Any patient who takes Leqembi or Kisunla, the new Alzheimer’s drugs that were recently approved by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration, could be hit with a side effect, the most serious of which are brain hemorrhages and swelling in the brain. Up to 40 percent of patients experience symptoms ranging from headaches to dizziness to seizures, but most have no idea this is happening inside their skulls, and the side effects are only detected on an MRI or other imaging scan.
The drugmakers have repeatedly claimed that the brain bleeds and swelling caused by the drugs usually are self-resolving, which means they disappear on their own. Others will “stabilize” with medical treatment. As if to emphasize how minor these events are, the companies call them “ARIA,” for Amyloid Related Imaging Abnormalities, which sounds far less alarming to the public than encephalitis or brain hemorrhages.
Not so fast, say some patients and experts, who are concerned that even in patients whose ARIA has resolved, there could be lasting damage to the brain not detected by an MRI. (The drugs can also speed up brain atrophy, which may be associated with rapid progression of dementia.)