For the first time, a test that detects 10 types of lipids, or fats, circulating in a person’s blood has been shown to predict accurately whether he or she will develop the memory loss and mental decline of Alzheimer’s disease over the next two to three years. A screening test based on the findings could be available in as little as two years, said the researchers who identified the blood biomarkers.

The effort to identify predictors of Alzheimer’s disease that are reliable, easy and inexpensive to detect was described Sunday in the journal Nature Medicine. Blood biomarkers for Alzheimer’s could make it possible to identify those at risk before they develop symptoms.

While no treatments for Alzheimer’s have proven effective in slowing or reversing its progress, the authors declared that earlier detection may open new treatment options. Interventions to head off or slow cognitive decline before it is evident might be more effective than intervening later, when dementia has already set in.

The researchers — from the University of Rochester, Georgetown University and the University of California, Irvine — did not start with a list of possible biomarkers, but recruited 525 subjects at least 70 years old. The team scoured their blood for possibilities while waiting to see which subjects would develop dementia symptoms.

Forty-six subjects were diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease upon entry into the study. And 28 went on to develop mild Alzheimer’s or amnestic mild cognitive impairment, a condition that often progresses to full-blown Alzheimer’s.