Alzeiheimers: Failing Drug Trials
Do we rely too much on drugs and not on prevention?
According to some recent researchers:
Between 2002 and 2012, they found 99.6% of trials of drugs aimed at preventing, curing or improving the symptoms of Alzheimer's had failed or been discontinued.
This compares with a failure rate of 81% for cancer drugs.
The failure rate was "especially troubling" given the rising numbers of people with dementia, said Dr Simon Ridley, of Alzheimer's Research UK.
"The authors of the study highlight a worrying decline in the number of clinical trials for Alzheimer's treatments in more recent years," he said.
"There is a danger that the high failure rates of trials in the past will discourage pharmaceutical companies from investing in dementia research.
"The only way we will successfully defeat dementia is to continue with high quality, innovative research, improve links with industry and increase investment in clinical trials."
Frankly, maybe instead of looking for drugs, research ought to look at other ways of staving off the effects of Alzeiheimers. There has been research on tests for Alzeiheimers and there is also newer research on alternative ways to prevent the disease.
I don't want to go on my big pharma rant here, but maybe looking for alternatives to drugs might just be the best thing?
Not just for this, but for many diseases, prevention may be better than drug treatment - especially when over 99% of the trial fail??
Just thinking out loud.....
Your thoughts? Comments?
Thank you
Sleep And Memory
Sleep! We all need sleep and most of us do not get enough of it:
Recent research shows:
Researchers at New York University School of Medicine and Peking University Shenzhen Graduate School trained mice in a new skill - walking on top of a rotating rod.
They then looked inside the living brain with a microscope to see what happened when the animals were either sleeping or sleep deprived.
Their study showed that sleeping mice formed significantly more new connections between neurons - they were learning more.
Yes, it was a study with mice, but many studies are done with mice and later found to be true with humans....
We already wrote about the cleansing aspect of sleep. Sleep rids brains of toxins.
And now we have another good reason to get sufficient sleep.
Do you get enough sleep?
Thoughts?
Comments?
Mother’s Day – 2014
The original mother’s day sentiment was put forth in an anti-war poem by Julia Ward Howe.
I doubt many modern day Mother’s Day shoppers even know how this day came to be – so please take time this weekend to reflect on the original thought.
Mother’s Day Proclamation – 1870
by Julia Ward HoweArise then…women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
“We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs.”
From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: “Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice.”
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace…
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God –
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.
Women, Poverty, And Shortened Lives
An article, Get Rich or Die Younger: The Shrinking Lifes Spans of Poor U.S. Women, includes the following 2 conclusions…
- Among men older than 55, life expectancies are growing fastest for the rich.
- Among women older than 55, life expectancies are growing for the rich and shrinking for the poor.
Being female, and being poor, is killing US women.
The only groups decreasing in life expectancy are poor women. The poorest 40% of women all lose years, and the poorer you are, the shorter your life.
No age group of poor men loses years, they may not gain, but they do not lose.
Take a look at the chart as it easy to read.
And with this scenario, the U.S. House wants to reduce aid to poor people!
Another reason I want to help older persons earn more money. We cannot rely on Social Security – it is too tenuous in the current political arena.
For more information on my ideas, go to Gray Wolf Productions.
Moving In With Your Parents. Not Just For Young Adults Anymore
It is not just new college graduates and young adults moving back home.
Now the 50-64 year olds are moving back home too.
For seven years through 2012, the number of Californians aged 50 to 64 who live in their parents’ homes swelled 67.6% to about 194,000, according to the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and the Insight Center for Community Economic Development.
The jump is almost exclusively the result of financial hardship caused by the recession rather than for other reasons, such as the need to care for aging parents, said Steven P. Wallace, a UCLA professor of public health who crunched the data.
Another sad commentary on the economy and the futures of middle aged parents…not to mention what happens to the next generations…
And why I redesigning my main website to include information on earning more income.
[You can sign up at gray wolf productions to receive information.]