In a New Approach to Fighting Disease, Helpful Genetic Mutations Are Sought (Links to an external site)
Over 150 people in Montgomery are set to gather this weekend to reclaim the future for the five millions Americans suffering from Alzheimer’s. For two women in the River Region, the disease has directly impacted their lives and they’re leading the fight for a cure.
Finding ways to diagnose and treat this devastating disease has frustrated scientists and clinicians ever since. Now the long and hard-fought campaign against Alzheimer’s has reached a potentially significant milestone: the launch of the first clinical trials to test whether new drug treatments given before dementia can prevent the disease.
Over the past several decades scientists have begun to unravel the complicated process that leads to the death of brain cells and, ultimately, the disease we call Alzheimer’s. That new understanding may lead to therapies that can halt the disease before symptoms appear and brains are irreparably damaged.
Researchers have long assumed that people with familial Alzheimer’s disease make too much Aβ42 in the brain, but they lacked proof. Now, in the June 12 Science Translational Medicine, researchers led by Randall Bateman at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri, provide the first direct evidence.
Could there possibly be a cure for Alzheimer’s disease in the future? Through the current DIAN Network Study and Drug Trials headquartered at Washington University in St. Louis, early detection and prevention could become a reality. Dr. Randall Bateman, Charles F. and Joanne Knight Distinguished Professor in Neurology Washington University School of Medicine in St. […]
The urgent need for better treatment of Alzheimer ‘s disease and other kinds of dementia was highlighted this past week with a report that said dementia cost this country as much as $215 billion a year. well, now there is a fascinating study going on involving some new drugs that might prevent Alzheimer ‘s. we […]