February 17, 2015

Today's Top Alzheimer's News

MUST READ

A February 15, 2015 The Republic article highlighted research into the genetic causes of Alzheimer's and profiled a community in Medellin, Colombia dealing with the disease. According to the article, "Nearly two decades ago, scientists traced the cause to a single genetic mutation passed from generation to generation. Locals call it the paisa mutation. Milena's family is among 26 extended clans of about 5,000 people who are known carriers of the mutation. It's the largest known familial cluster of early-onset Alzheimer's in the world…Led by doctors in Colombia and at Phoenix-based Banner Alzheimer's Institute, and run with funding from the National Institutes of Health and Banner, the drug trial aims to recruit 300 members of these families and test them for the trait. Then, 200 people with the mutation will be given experimental drugs or a placebo. Another 100 people who do not carry the mutation will also get a placebo. The medical experiment is a departure from other Alzheimer's disease studies, which have waited until the disease has already wrecked the brain to test whether an experimental drug could reverse the course. The Colombian study will test people while they still think clearly. These participants have their memory intact, though they carry the mutation that will one day scuttle their cognitive ability. The $100 million-plus study has been underway for a year, and doctors expect it to last four more years. Soon after that, they could have their first answers about whether the experimental drug — one in a class of drugs that attack a similar biological target — can help stop Alzheimer's if people take it early enough. But what's at stake is more complicated than whether the drug works. The trial will also test the timing of the therapy as well as the very idea that Alzheimer's disease can be knocked off its course if doctors and patients intervene soon enough."


GENDER IMPACT

A February 14, 2015 The Guardian article underscored the disproportionate impact of Alzheimer's on women in the UK. According to the article, "Women are bearing the brunt of the dementia epidemic that is spreading through Britain. A study by Alzheimer’s Research UK reveals that the condition has not only become the leading cause of death among British women but that women are far more likely to end up as carers of sufferers than men – suffering physical and emotional stress and job losses in the process…The study, to be published next month, calls for the government to make a significant increase in its funding of dementia research and an improved investment in care." 


RESEARCH, SCIENCE, AND TECHNOLOGY 

A February 16, 2015 The Guardian article reported that "scientists at the University of Cambridge have identified a crucial molecule that could put the brakes on the damage to the brain." According to the article, "The study in mice showed that the “housekeeping” molecule put the brakes on a runaway process in the brain that leads to the most common form of dementia. The substance works by slowing the accumulation of sticky clumps of protein in the brain, which typically appear years before symptoms such as memory loss become apparent in patients. Although the molecule tested would be difficult to convert into a drug for use in humans, the scientists said, the findings prove that the cycle that leads to Alzheimer’s devastating impact on memory and personality can be interrupted. Samuel Cohen, who led the study at the University of Cambridge, said: “The big advantage is that we haven’t just come up with a drug and not really understood what it is doing. We’ve come up with a general strategy that could work.”'

A February 16, 2015 BBC News article reported "a new network of £30m research centres is being launched to spearhead the search for an Alzheimer's cure." According to the  article, "Alzheimer's Research UK has announced a Drug Discovery Alliance, which will see research centres pooling their expertise to fight the disease.These drug discovery institutes will be at Cambridge and Oxford Universities and University College London. Dementia affects more than 830,000 people in the UK and costs the economy £23bn a year, the charity says. The Drug Discovery Institutes will see about 90 new research scientists, recruited over the next five years, employed in state-of-the-art facilities to fast-track the development of new treatments for Alzheimer's disease and other dementias."