CAA - Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy

CAA (Cerebral Amyloid Angiopathy) is a brain disease that repeatedly causes cerebral haemorrhage and cerebral infarction.

Toxic protein accumulation
The disease is caused in the small blood vessels of the brains. In the wall of the barrels accumulates amyloid (toxic protein). This causes the brain hemorrhage and infarction
This may lead to paralysis, dementia and death. People die immediately or they may worsen with each new bleeding and eventually die. They live, so to speak, with a time bomb.
The disease is incurable, but it does not have to be. There has to be a solution. We want to find the solution quickly since it is becoming clearer and clearer what the sheer scale is: one in every four people older than 60 get CAA. Unnecessary personal suffering that can be prevented.

How do you know that you have CAA?
People who have CAA, will discover it only after they have had a stroke. If this bleeding meets the so-called "Boston criteria", there is a good chance are that it is caused by CAA. The criteria are: the person is 55 years or older; has had one or more minor bleeding at certain places in the brains and there are no other explanations for the bleeding.
People with the genetic variant are the key to the solution. This group has the sad certainty to get the disease at a young age. Because they can already be investigated before the disease strikes, the cause can be discovered. A solution for them, is a solution for everyone with CAA.
There are not enough research funds for this group. Therefore, the Dutch CAA Foundation has been established, to remove this unnecessary time bomb out of many lifes.

Read more about CAA on the page about congenital CAA