This very large family in the country of Colombia has become very important to Alzheimer’s researchers. Here’s a good New York Times article on the family in yesterday’s paper:
www.nytimes.com/2010/06/02/health/02alzheimers.html
Alzheimer’’s Stalks a Colombian Family
By Pam Belluck
New York Times
June 1, 2010
Here are two quotations from two of the neurologists involved in researching this Colombian family:
* “This is the only place in the world where we can find a family like this, where it’s possible to do prevention therapy more easily,”” said Dr. Francisco Lopera, a Medellín neurologist who identified the family’’s illness 28 years ago and helped discover its cause, an altered protein on the presenilin 1 gene on chromosome 14: the Paisa mutation.
* Scientists consider Colombians not only valuable subjects but also deserving ones. “”We’’d be giving people at the highest imminent risk of Alzheimer’’s access to treatment they wouldn’’t otherwise have,”” said a project leader, Dr. Eric M. Reiman, director of Banner Alzheimer’s Institute in Phoenix.