Preventive Neurology

Is exenatide the game-changer we need in Parkinson's disease? #PreventiveNeurology #PredictPD Would you participate in a study to define your future risk of getting Parkinson's Disease (PD)? In other words would you like to know you are likely to develop PD in the future? A lot of people answer by saying it depends if you have a treatment to prevent PD. At present we don't, but the study below of a  exenatide ,  a glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) receptor agonist, suggests it may be neuroprotective in patients with established PD. If this study's findings are confirmed in larger phase 3 studies and leads to exenatide being licensed as a disease-modifying therapy, or DMT, for PD changes all this. This means we can take people at high-risk of developing PD and randomise them to receive either placebo or exenatide to see if it can prevent, or at least delay the onset of, PD. This study alone creates the incentive for people from the general public to participate in po...

Age is a disease vs. Ageing as a natural biological process: have your say  #PreventiveNeurology #HealthyAgeing I have always cracked the joke 'that life is a sexually transmitted neurodegenerative disease with a 100% mortality' . This usually gets a mutated laugh until people start pondering the implications of the joke and realise that I am being serious. Evolution never designed, and selected, the human brain and nervous system to function much past 35 years of age. It is only relatively recently that life expectancy has increased with the requirement of our brains to function into old age. It is clear that when we measure cognitive function, and brain volume, it is all downhill from about 35 years of age. Those of us who are older than 35 notice the subtle cognitive impairments that increase with age and the gradual malfunction of our nervous systems. When last have you tried tight-rope walking? Your failing balance system is simply a reflection of the global rot t...