Researchers: Reagan's Speeches Reveal Alzheimer's Clues

Researchers at Arizona State University say they have uncovered subtle hints of early dementia in some of the speeches Ronald Reagan gave before he was formally diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 1994.

Specifically, the researchers uncovered anomalies in the President's speeches, such as use of repetitive words and substituting nonspecific terms such as "thing" for specific nouns. To uncover the patterns, they used an algorithm that analyzes changes in speech patterns.

The researchers point out that their findings do not provide any evidence that Reagan was impaired while he was in office. Instead, they hope their results could provide tools to spot the disease years before symptoms become clinically evident.

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