[LindaH]

BBC radio will be broadcasting a program about the GDNF controversey
this Wednesday night 9 PM GMT (4 PM EST) on BBC Radio 4. The
program is called "Chasing a Cure" and it was produced and created by
Tom Isaacs.

Tom is a co-founder of the Cure Parkinson's Trust in the UK, a member
of the EPDA board, and an all around great person. I heard him speak
and had the opportunity to talk with him at the World Parkinson's
Congress last February.

The radio program will be available live on the Internet. The URL is
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio/
and then click on Radio 4
It will then be available on the website to listen to a for week
afterwards - type in the bbc radio search engine "chasing a cure" and
that should take you there.

Here's a preview from the BBC press office:
BBC RADIO 4 Wednesday 8 November 2006

Chasing A Cure
Wednesday 8 November
9.00-9.30pm BBC RADIO 4

"Tom Isaacs, who was diagnosed with Parkinson's when he was 27, revisits his personal investigation into treatments for the disease to discover what happened to the cure that, in 2001, he was promised was just five years away.

Five years ago on BBC Radio 4 in Young Man, Old Body, Tom Isaacs went on a personal journey to meet leading research scientists and investigate their claims that they were close to a cure. His findings were disheartening until he met Dr Stephen Gill in the Frenchay Hospital in Bristol, who was testing a revolutionary treatment using a patented delivery system to pump a hormone, GDNF, directly into the dopamine receptor cells in patients' brains. His results in human trials were astonishing. His disabled, alienated patients had their bodies restored by his treatment and their lives transformed. On post-mortem examination it was discovered that Gill's technique had actually caused the dopamine cells (destroyed in Parkinson's patients) to re-grow. It reversed the disease process and seemed to be the cure that all had been looking for.
But last year the American drug company Amgen, which owned the patent for the drug essential for this treatment, withdrew its support, citing safety fears as the reason for stopping human trials. The patients who had regained their lives because of the treatment were left to revert to their former disabled state.
Although focused on Parkinson's, this programme will strike a chord with anyone whose family has been affected by a chronic illness, and wants to have the chance to regain control of information and medicine affecting their own health from the medical professionals. It raises pertinent questions about the nature of human trials and pharmaceutical testing protocols. "

Presenter/Tom Isaacs, Producer/Lucy Dichmont"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pro...wk45/wed.shtml
BBC Radio 4 Publicity

[Howardh]

so much about GDNF it will be worth the wait to listen to. I only hope it is a fair and balanced view on why the process was discontinued after early powerful success.

GO HARD SCIENCE

[olsen]

thanks for posting this--and am bumping it up. madelyn