TNF and Mental deterioration: It may be significant that elevated baseline TNF-α was a stronger predictor of decline than acute SIE in AD patients (Holmes et al., 2009) and one might predict that chronic elevation of peripheral TNF-α levels would be a better strategy to fully address the hypothesis that elevated systemic TNF-α is a contributor to chronic neurodegeneration and cognitive decline (as opposed to acute cognitive dysfunction occuring during acute inflammatory episodes).