{"id":13091,"date":"2017-04-13T18:23:58","date_gmt":"2017-04-13T17:23:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/?p=13091"},"modified":"2017-04-14T10:32:04","modified_gmt":"2017-04-14T09:32:04","slug":"creating-a-world-without-parkinsons-200-years-after-an-essay-on-a-shaking-palsy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/2017\/04\/13\/creating-a-world-without-parkinsons-200-years-after-an-essay-on-a-shaking-palsy","title":{"rendered":"Creating a world without Parkinson\u2019s 200 years after ‘An Essay on the Shaking Palsy’"},"content":{"rendered":"

A guest blog by James Beck, Ph.D., Vice President and Chief Scientific Officer, Parkinson\u2019s Foundation<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Dr James Beck<\/p><\/div>\n

This year, we mark 200 years since James Parkinson published his famous monograph, An Essay on the Shaking Palsy<\/em><\/a>. <\/em>In that time, we have reached many key milestones in science that have dramatically improved the lives of the ten million people worldwide who live with Parkinson’s.\u00a0 Yet we still have nothing to slow the disease and nothing to stop it.<\/p>\n

At the Parkinson\u2019s Foundation, we consider the bicentennial anniversary of James Parkinson\u2019s work a perfect time to look back at lessons learned and ahead at what\u2019s to come. For example, looking back at the time that has passed since 1817, few milestones have been as monumental as the identification of levodopa by George Cotzias<\/a> in 1967<\/a> and its subsequent confirmation as a life-changing Parkinson\u2019s treatment by Dr. Melvin Yahr in 1968<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Today, our community still relies on levodopa as the gold-standard drug to treat Parkinson\u2019s motor symptoms<\/a>. Despite the lack of newer drugs, scientific progress has not stopped. In fact, we predict that advances in the next 20 years will likely outpace the progress of the past 200<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

As we scan the horizon, we are seeing advances in healthcare and science that will lead to new ways of living better with the disease. The increasing intersections between information technology, healthcare, biomarkers, and genetics may help us to predict who will develop Parkinson\u2019s. Meanwhile, advances in technology are portending a day when we can accurately measure the progression of Parkinson\u2019s<\/a>. Most importantly, we may be on the cusp of testing new hypotheses that will allow us to reach our ultimate end goal of stopping Parkinson\u2019s.<\/p>\n

This is exciting. However, if we want these advances to come to fruition, we must heed the lessons learned from Cotzias\u2019s story — the need for human capital.<\/p>\n

Many people may be surprised to learn that Cotzias\u2019 key discovery of levodopa and Dr. Yahr\u2019s follow-up study were milestones that were nearly missed. In the 1960s, funding was plentiful, and many researchers were testing levodopa. Where so many failed, only Cotzias succeeded, and he did so by taking a unique approach that no one could have predicted would work<\/a>.<\/p>\n

His story illustrates what many scientists know: that we cannot predict where answers will come from, and that we need a diverse cadre of people looking at diseases from different angles to solve them. Thus, he tells us what we need to create a world without Parkinson\u2019s \u2013 people.<\/p>\n

We need people who dedicate their careers to Parkinson\u2019s research. Yet, over the past 20 years, human capital in the research community has been in jeopardy<\/a>. The average a<\/a>ge at which a scientist receives his or her first R01<\/a> (the original and historically oldest grant mechanism used by the NIH) has crept up from their 30s to their early 40s, leading droves of talented researchers to leave the lab for more stable careers.<\/p>\n

If we don\u2019t change our way of thinking about the next generation of scientists, we could easily lose a cadre of researchers who are at the prime of their careers<\/a>.\u00a0 At the Parkinson\u2019s Foundation, we are doing our part by dedicating millions of dollars to support early-career scientists and clinicians.<\/p>\n

But this isn\u2019t enough. As a society, we need to value the up-and-coming generation for their creativity and support their ingenuity. A few weeks from now, on June 1st, we\u2019re bringing together some of the best and brightest of the next generation for a scientific event entitled, \u201cWorld Without Parkinson\u2019s.\u201d<\/a> We\u2019re asking one question of each these up-and-coming leaders, \u201cHow do you predict your area of expertise will help to end Parkinson\u2019s?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Will any of them have the right answer? Is the next George Cotzias among our speakers?<\/p>\n

We don\u2019t know. But we know that we have to continue to ask the question and make opportunities available for researchers to thrive until we find him or her.<\/p>\n

In fact, it\u2019s the only way we can find the world we envision — the one in which Parkinson\u2019s no longer exists.<\/p>\n

The Parkinson\u2019s Foundation is working toward a world without Parkinson\u2019s disease. Formed by the merger of National Parkinson Foundation and the Parkinson\u2019s Disease Foundation in August 2016, the mission of the Parkinson\u2019s Foundation is to invest in promising scientific research that will end Parkinson\u2019s disease and improve the lives of people with Parkinson\u2019s, and their families, through improved treatments, support and the best care. For more information, visit www.parkinsonsfoundation.org<\/a> or call (800) 4PD-INFO (473-4636) or (800) 457-6676.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This year, we mark 200 years since James Parkinson published his famous monograph, An Essay on the Shaking Palsy. In that time, we have reached many key milestones in science that have dramatically improved the lives of the ten million people worldwide who live with Parkinson\u2019s.\u00a0 Yet we still have nothing to slow the disease and nothing to stop it.  Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99127,"featured_media":13109,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[266527],"tags":[266567,219,266569,305,233],"class_list":["post-13091","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-research-funding","tag-funding","tag-health","tag-parkinsons-foundation","tag-parkinsons","tag-research"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13091","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99127"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13091"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13091\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/13109"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13091"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13091"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.nature.com\/ofschemesandmemes\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13091"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}