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Drug Halts Decline In Alzheimer's Patients
ljw1004 writes "Alzheimer's researchers are divided on whether the disease is caused by 'beta amyloid' (a peptide found in Alzheimer brains) or by 'tau protein' (normally used for cellular scaffolding, but can aggregate out of control and destroy neurons). Today in Chicago a new drug has been announced that stops tau aggregation and appears to have halted Alzheimer's-related decline in 300 clinical trial patients. The drug is known as 'rember.' Do you have friends or family who appear to be on the road to dementia? Here is an online questionnaire, part of one used in the clinical trial to diagnose dementia. (Disclosure: I made the online questionnaire, and my father is one of the scientists behind the drug.)"
I imagine they started writing remember, but forgot how far they'd gotten when committing it to paper.
For clarity and completeness I should add:
This is awesome news. My grandfather is suffering from an advanced state of this disease and it's horrible to see in what state he currently 'lives'.
He does not recognize me, or my brothers, or my parents (inc. his own son!).
Perhaps my first post (parent) sounded like I did not take this seriously. I guess it's more of a coping mechanism that got in action.
To all the scientists: please keep up this wonderful work! It'll probably be too late for my grandfather, but no-one should have to suffer like.
I hope that it won't be long before it helps to save many lives from being destroyed.
It's important to remember that Dementia != Alzheimer's. Alzheimer's can cause a form of dementia (Alzheimer's-related dementia), but dementia has many other causes, some are age-related and some are not.
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Its nasty, I worked in Alzheimers care for years.
What's worse is the routine treatment of Alzheimers patients with anti psychotic drugs, Most of my time as a nurse in that field was spent undoing the damage caused by such ill advised prescribing of chemical straight jackets to deal with minor behavioural issues.
If this drug can stop Alzheimers from getting worse once diagnosed I'd be happy, both professionally, and selfishly (I want Pratchett on this stuff NOW).
This drug is in the second of three phases which are required prior to FDA approval.
Phase 1: safety at various dosages
Phase 2: small test of efficacy and determining proper dosage
Phase 3: larger test of efficacy
It is still years away from the market. There was a screw-up in the formulation of the highest dose in this study, and the lowest dose had no effect, so only the middle of three doses tried had any effect. I found that out here
Unless you recently fired a bunch of US Attorneys, in which case losing your memory can be extraordinarily helpful.
(I'm a PhD Neuroscience student) It seems like more and more scientists are moving away from the beta amyloid plaque buildup hypthesis. While it seemed like a great lead, people who die with no symptoms of dementia or Alzheimer's Disease can still have a buildup of beta amyloid plaque as massive as the person who did die of Alzheimer's. It could be that high levels of beta amyloid plaque buildup increases the risk of getting Alzheimer's, though. It's a hard disease to crack, that's for sure. If this new drug really does work, it'll save 5 million lives a year, and that's just in the past few years; as the Baby Boomers all get past 65 we're going to start seeing a massive increase in Alzheimer's Disease.
I don't mean to hurt your feelings, but I do work in health care, on a Memory Care Unit, specifically. The MCU is designed for people with many forms of dementia, our most common diagnosis being Alzheimer's. I am sure you know many of the ugly symptoms of this disease. Confusion, loss of memory, loss of fine motor skills, deteriorating ability to perform activities of daily living, eventual death, etc. This drug may sound like a godsend, but think about it for a moment.
If your loved one breaks down crying several times a day because he or she can't tell where everyone is or where they are, if he goes into violent rages because he thinks he is being held against his will, if he lives in a constant state of fear because he knows something is wrong but he can't figure out what it is, if he tries day after day to go home but his captors refuse to et him go, causing him to fear for his life... do you really want a drug that will keep him in that state, somewhat permanently?
At best, wait until the affected person progresses to a state of Alzheimer's that is more comfortable for him or her -- around stage 5 (out of 7 total) people forget that something is wrong and they happily live their lives in total confusion. Then start the drug therapy. But stalling people's progress in a state that makes them absolutely miserable is not a miracle drug's miracle cure. It's torture.
Check out http://www.iatbdementiacare.com/index2.html I worked with the guy who runs the site and wrote the book on Dementia Possible Care. He is crazy insightful and smart when it comes to caring for people with Alzheimer's. Trust me, the $20 for the book will serve you tremendously.
Unless you are talking about Windows
First of all I understand completely what you're saying and to a certain extend that is true.
But on the other side, his body is starting to fail and he is suffering from that. "Gradually, minor and major bodily functions are lost" as Wikipedia describes it.
It's getting somewhat better now, but recently he could barely breath, general pain all over his body and basically unable to swallow, combined with a cough he developed. He could not even eat Apple mush when helped.
Every now and then he has a 'good moment' and suddenly he can say more than 5 words without falling asleep again, but the general condition is suffering for him.
I know this could sound weird to some, but every time he closes his eyes I just hope that he drifts away to a better place and stays there.