UK Project Advances Blood-Based Dementia Testing Toward Routine Clinical Care

Dementia is the leading cause of death in the UK, accounting for almost one in eight deaths, with more than 72,000 people dying from dementia, including Alzheimer’s disease, in 2025. Despite this burden, diagnosis can still take months and sometimes more than a year, delaying access to support, treatment, and research opportunities. To help accelerate diagnosis, researchers are advancing a blood biomarker project for use in National Health Service (NHS) memory services.

According to Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust, the Oxford and Dementias Platform UK (DPUK)-led project centers on integrating blood-based dementia biomarkers into routine NHS memory services. The biomarker panel is currently being validated through the Blood Biomarker Challenge-funded READ-OUT study. The project will now roll out the biomarkers at 6–10 NHS memory service sites as part of the standard clinical pathway to understand how the approach could be implemented across memory clinics.

The project brings together researchers from the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge, Imperial College London, and DPUK. It is one of nine projects selected for the UK Research and Innovation NHS Fit for the Future Dementia Challenge. The program is backed by up to GBP 80 million through the Department for Business and Trade’s Research & Development Missions Accelerator Programme and aims to accelerate adoption of technologies and approaches that could help people receive faster diagnoses of memory disorders by 2029.

The Dementia Challenge is designed to support projects that demonstrate measurable benefits for both patients and health services, with participating teams required to meet key milestones to advance to future funding stages. Within this framework, the project represents a further step toward translating dementia biomarker research into routine clinical practice and aligns with DPUK’s broader mission to accelerate discoveries for people affected by dementia.

“Blood-based biomarkers have the potential to transform dementia diagnosis within NHS memory services. Building on the evidence generated through the READ-OUT study, this project will help us understand how these tests can be integrated into routine clinical pathways and at which point they would be most effective in supporting timely and accurate diagnoses,” said Professor Vanessa Raymont, Director of DPUK and Director of R&D at Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust.

“We aim to establish a blueprint for their use across the NHS by 2029, which would be truly transformative for services, as earlier diagnosis can help people living with dementia and their families access support, treatment and information at a crucial point in their journey,” added Professor Raymont.

Related Links
Oxford Health NHS Foundation Trust
Dementias Platform UK