From the Directors
Neurological Disease Drug Discovery: Unmet Need, Enormous Opportunity
One of the most pressing healthcare challenges facing our country and the developed world in the 21st Century is a stunning lack of therapies for neurological diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease). Because of advances in the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases and many forms of cancer, and due to changing age demographics and lifestyle, we are currently experiencing a massive expansion in the proportion of our population 50 to 90 years of age. However, while the medical field has achieved notable success in developing drugs and surgical techniques for treating patients in this age range with vascular and orthopedic maladies, we currently have very little to offer to patients who are afflicted with dementia, Parkinson’s disease, or ALS. Recognizing these are age-related disorders, where incidence increases as one gets older, the scope of this problem is clear and promises to place an enormous socioeconomic burden on our society. Beyond the tragic toll that such diseases take on patients, who lose the ability to think, move, and care for themselves, this also represents a serious challenge to the fabric of our society, as support systems are lacking to help families take on the care of afflicted family members, often resulting in psychological and financial hardships.
Neurotherapeutics is now at a turning point
While these observations are sobering, there is reason for optimism, because we have made incredible progress in better understanding why these diseases occur, and in developing powerful therapies for neurodegenerative diseases. Here at UC Irvine, we are perfectly positioned to make transformative discoveries that will lead to many more new treatments for neurological diseases. To realize this goal, we have just launched a new initiative known as the UCI Center for Neurotherapeutics (UCI CNT).