[VICTORIALOU]

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0303134435.htm

"ScienceDaily (Mar. 3, 2011) — Unexpected results from a Scripps Research Institute and ModGene, LLC study could completely alter scientists' ideas about Alzheimer's disease -- pointing to the liver instead of the brain as the source of the "amyloid" that deposits as brain plaques associated with this devastating condition. The findings could offer a relatively simple approach for Alzheimer's prevention and treatment"


"The mice were administered imatinib (trade name Gleevec, an FDA-approved cancer drug), a relatively new drug currently approved for treatment of chronic myelogenous leukemia and gastrointestinal tumors. The drug potently reduces the production of beta amyloid in neuroblastoma cells transfected by amyloid precursor protein (APP) and also in cell-free extracts prepared from the transfected cells. Importantly, Gleevec has poor penetration of the blood-brain barrier in both mice and humans.

"This characteristic of the drug is precisely why we chose to use it," Sutcliffe explained. "Because it doesn't penetrate the blood-brain barrier, we were able to focus on the production of amyloid outside of the brain and how that production might contribute to amyloid that accumulates in the brain, where it is associated with disease."

The mice were injected with Gleevec twice a day for seven days; then plasma and brain tissue were collected, and the amount of beta amyloid in the blood and brain was measured. The findings: the drug dramatically reduced beta amyloid not only in the blood, but also in the brain where the drug cannot penetrate. Thus, an appreciable portion of brain amyloid must originate outside of the brain, and imatinib represents a candidate for preventing and treating Alzheimer's."

Hopefully this will translate into the plaques for PD also !!

[Conductor71]

Anything that gets researchers seeing beyond the brain and realizing they are systemic is good for all of us with neurodegenerative disease. Fascinating and good news in battle against neurological conditions

Thanks for sharing!

Laura

[mrsD]

That is something!

Now if it turns out well, I hope the price of Gleevec will come down. It is horrendously expensive presently.

[indigogo]

This seems very promising. I love to see researchers looking at our body as more of an integrated whole rather than an aggregate of parts.

I am in Denver with my parents right now. I visited my mom for the first time yesterday at the nursing facility that is now her home as a person with Alzheimer's. She recognized me! - but that lasted less than a minute, with flashes of remembrance sparkling briefly throughout our three hour visit. All in all, I'd rather have PD, and I am happy to see hope through science in both of these horrible diseases.

[VICTORIALOU]

So sorry about your mom Carey - that must be so difficult for you.
I just lost my mother in November.
I SO agree with you and the others, that it seems promising to have any disease looked at more holistically.

[moondaughter]

Originally Posted by indigogo

This seems very promising. I love to see researchers looking at our body as more of an integrated whole rather than an aggregate of parts.

I am in Denver with my parents right now. I visited my mom for the first time yesterday at the nursing facility that is now her home as a person with Alzheimer's. She recognized me! - but that lasted less than a minute, with flashes of remembrance sparkling briefly throughout our three hour visit. All in all, I'd rather have PD, and I am happy to see hope through science in both of these horrible diseases.

Gosh Carey,

I am so sorry. we are so inextricably linked to our mothers....I'm sure some part of her was very aware of you even tho she has mentally checked out-hard noto to take it personally I'm sure

the Chinese have a saying "when the baby is sick treat the mother"....they view organs to have a hieracchy, i.e. the liver is mother to the heart - stomach is mother to the lungs and so forth. interesting that our mitochondrial DNA comes only from our mother....

sharilyn