USA2 SPOTLIGHT

A July 20, 2017 Medium piece by LatinosAgainstAlzheimer’s Executive Director, Jason Resendez, highlighted his time at the 2017 Aspen Health Festival. According to Resendez, “Unfortunately, few of the sessions outlined concrete recommendations and case studies for engaging communities in cutting-edge research and personalized health. This omission underscored the importance of UsAgainstAlzheimer’s efforts to bring research opportunities directly to communities via collaborations with Antidote, a patient-centric clinical trial search platform, and A-List for Research, a virtual gateway to a constellation of innovative initiatives that makes it easy consumers to influence and participate in Alzheimer’s and brain health research.”

A July 20, 2017 USC Q&A with María Aranda, an associate professor holding joint appointments with the USC Suzanne Dworak-Peck School of Social Work and the USC Leonard Davis School of Gerontology, discussed depression among aging Latino populations and its relationship to diseases like Alzheimer's. Dr. Aranda is an advisor of the LatinosAgainstAlzheimer’s Network. 

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A July 21, 2017 WSB Radio (AM 750) article spotlighted a Minnesota couple who got married 25 days after becoming engaged so the bride’s mother, who has Alzheimer’s, could enjoy the wedding. According to the bride, “I never thought I would have my mom at my wedding. So it was a treasure to have her with us for the day.”

A July 20, 2017 Los Angeles Times article looked at a new report from the Lancet Commission on Dementia Prevention, Intervention and Care, which concluded that more than one in three Alzheimer’s and dementia cases can be traced to factors such as inadequate education, obesity, hearing loss and smoking. Preventative measures such as universal preschool, senior visiting clubs, exercise, healthy diets, blood pressure management, clean air and preventative healthcare would have a big impact on seniors. The failure to complete more than eight years of school is childhood’s most potent risk factor for developing dementia, found to be a more powerful driver than the ApoE-e4 gene variant.

A July 20, 2017 Medical News Today article reported on a plenary session by Julie Williams, PhD from the Division of Psychological Medicine and Clinical Neurosciences Professor at Cardiff University in the UK, at the Alzheimer's Association International Conference, positing that "immunity is playing a significant role" in Alzheimer’s disease. According to Williams, "Alzheimer's disease is more of an autoinflammatory disease, than anything else. What we are seeing with immunity is happening quite early in the disease and maybe a primary event that is happening alongside amyloid [accumulation]. What we need to do is to understand mechanisms."

INDUSTRY UPDATES

A July 20, 2017 Grand Forks Herald article highlighted Encore at Avalon Park, an assisted living and memory care facility using virtual reality to help residents with dementia by soothing, reducing agitation and depression. The VR scenes by MyndVR are designed to evoke nostalgia, serenity and wonder. "Our plan is to essentially be the Netflix of VR for seniors," said MyndVR CEO and Co-Founder, Chris Brickler.