USA2 SPOTLIGHT

Join us next Friday, August 24, 2018 from 1-2pm (EST) for our next Alzheimer’s Talks with Dr. Yakeel Quiroz of Harvard, Dr. Tabassum Majid of the Integrace Institute, and clinical trial participant/caregiver-advocate Daisy Duarte. 

RESEARCH AND SCIENCE

An August 16, 2018 New Atlas article looked at why some people with amyloid beta and tau build-up in the brain don’t experience neurological damage and cognitive decline resulting in Alzheimer’s disease. At the University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston, researchers are tackling this question. “When nerve cells can't communicate because of the buildup of these toxic proteins that disrupt synapse, thought and memory become impaired. The next key question was then what makes the synapse of these resilient individuals capable of rejecting the dysfunctional binding of amyloid beta and tau?” said study author Giulio Taglialatela. Also covered by EurekAlert! 

CLINICAL TRIAL SPOTLIGHT

An August 16, 2018 WLKY broadcast segment focused on Alzheimer’s disease research at the University of Kentucky at the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging, which is one of the leading recruiters for AD clinical trials in the U.S. According to Donna Wilcock, “We're kind of at the front line of when new drugs come on the market and when new drugs are being tested our patients will have the first access to those drugs which makes us very happy. Alzheimer's is characterized by these plaques and tangles these protein aggregates in the brain.” Click here for more information on clinical trials at the Center.

OPINION

An August 16, 2018 AL.com opinion piece by Mike Oliver, who has Lewy body dementia, wonders why LBD is so unknown. According to Oliver, “That's not good for the more than a million folks that have the second leading cause of dementia after Alzheimer's. That's not good for the uncounted others who have it but don't know they have it, either because the doctor didn't make the diagnosis, missed the diagnosis, or the individual is passing off early stages of the disease as something else.”