Exploring the Use of Wearable Technologies in Lewy Body Dementia Diagnosis and Treatment
Dr. Debby Tsuang, MD, and collaborators are working to improve the diagnosis of Lewy Body Dementia and dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease, using novel in-home measures of sleep and movement. Read story.
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 ADRC Pilot Project Update: Obesity and Dementia
At the ADRC Pilot Project Update on February 6, the Center learned about the obesity epidemic and the relationship between obesity, fat cell biology, and neurodegenerative disease. Dr. Robert J. Freishtat, M.D., M.P.H., Professor in Pediatrics and Genomics and Precision Medicine, George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences, presented his project titled: Obesity and Dementia: MicroRNAs from Adipocyte-derived Small Extracellular Vesicles are associated with Neurodegenerative Pathways. Read story.
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Register for Spring Session here or call Marigrace at 206-744-2017
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Events for People with Younger Onset Alzheimer's
Have you or a loved one been diagnosed with memory loss or dementia before age 65? Would you like to connect with others in a similar situation?
The UW Memory and Brain Wellness Center has several opportunities for you this Spring, including our annual Younger Onset Alzheimer's Resource & Education Day in April, and a new monthly version of our outdoor adventure program, SOAR (Shared Outdoor Adventures for Resilience).
Sign up to receive updates here or call Program Manager Marigrace Becker at 206-744-2017
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NEW "Mindful Adventure Connections" program offered at North Bellevue Community Center. Designed for people with mild memory loss, the program provides the opportunity for sociability, creativity, stimulation and adventure. Tuesdays, 11:30 a.m. - 2:30 p.m., Bellevue, WA. View flyer here.
Join Silver Kite Community Arts for a special "Caregiver and the Arts" event offered at Edmonds Center for the Arts. This event for professional or family caregivers offers ideas for using the arts as respite, or as part of your care approach. Monday, March 23, 10 a.m. - 2:30 p.m. Edmonds, WA. Free; lunch included. More info here.
Join the Alzheimer's Association for its annual Discovery Conference for healthcare professionals. Wednesday 4/1, Lynnwood, WA. More info here.
Save the date for the annual Momentia Talent Share! This special event is an opportunity for people with memory loss and their family members to be creative, have fun, and let your talents shine. Sign up to participate or come to watch. Offered by Seattle Parks and Recreation and the Greenwood Senior Center. Saturday, April 18, 2 - 4 p.m., Seattle, WA. More info here.
This Spring, attend an Alzheimer's Association "Community Forum" to share what programs and services you would like to see in your community. Offered in multiple locations across the state: Burlington, Port Townsend, Port Angeles, Puyallup, Longview, South Sound. More info here.
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We are thrilled to welcome Allyson Schrier, MFA, as the Program Manager for the Dementia ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) project at the Memory and Brain Wellness Center.
Schrier joined our team after the UW received new funds, allocated in the state budget, to organize a cross-institutional collaboration to provide training on best practices, using the proven telehealth model of Project ECHO. This project will provide a virtual connection for providers, available in our rural areas, and experts to offer education sessions and case conferences, with an emphasis on transforming practice and solving systemic issues that affect dementia care delivery. Schrier's work will support Dr. Kristoffer Rhoads, PhD and Dr. Nancy Isenberg, MD, MPH, FAAN., to bring the program to life and then keep it vibrant.
Schrier previously worked as a project manager in technology companies including Microsoft, Kymeta Corp., Vulcan, and Asymetrix. She was Head of Technology for the Experience Music Project.
Nurturing a deep interest in promoting dementia awareness, she teaches professional care partners the state mandated Dementia and Mental Health classes, and she teaches a class called How (and why) to be Friends with People Living with Dementia at libraries, churches and CCRCs in the Puget Sound area.
Her favorite activities involve spending time outside with her dog, mountain biking, cross-country skiing, and gardening. Schrier also writes books for kids and is currently working on one in which the main character is a turtle with living with memory loss (who is well supported by his friends Heron, Otter and Bear). |
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UPCOMING RESEARCH TALK
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NIA Featured Research
Outreach/Science Writing Opportunity
Would you like to contribute an article, essay, or story idea to Dimensions Magazine about your research and receive science writing experience with help from a professional editor? Please contact Genevieve Wanucha at gwanucha@uw.edu.
Funding & Educational Opportunities
2020
James S. McDonnell Foundation Opportunity Awards
The James S. McDonnell Foundation announces a new funding opportunity in 2020 encouraging researchers to pursue important questions using conceptual and methodological approaches informed by biological and experiential trajectories contributing to the ongoing development of cognition and behavior across the lifespan. The new JSMF Opportunity Awards provide up to $250,000 in seed funds expendable over a flexible time period (between 2 and 4 years) as needed by researchers to design and carry out studies motivated by questioning, revisiting, or re-examining the current state of academic knowledge of human cognition and behavior using a dynamic, context-sensitive lens. New theories, tools and techniques have opened myriad opportunities for rigorously studying cognition and behavior as individuals engage in ongoing real-world activities in everyday life contexts in ways not previously possible. JSMF is particularly interested in supporting applications from researchers who may not now be using the approaches described in this call for proposals, but who want to adopt this approach as an experimentally coherent way of conceptualizing, designing, and pursuing an understanding of human cognition and behavior.
The deadline for applications is April 14, 2020. More information about the program and application guidelines can be found on the JSMF Opportunity Awards web page.
NIH Accepting Applications for New Career Development Award
NIH is accepting applications for a new career development award: The MOSAIC K99/R00. This award will kick-start careers of investigators from diverse backgrounds. NIH efforts to enhance diversity have focused on earlier training stages, with programs for undergraduates and predocs. The Maximizing Opportunities for Scientific and Academic Independent Careers (MOSAIC) awards bring these efforts into later career stages. For more information, please visit https://edgeforscholars.org/nih-offers-new-type-of-k99-r00/.
Maude’s Awards for Innovation in Alzheimer’s Care Open to all, Maude’s Awards, a program of the Richard and Maude Ferry Foundation, will make eight annual awards – three $25,000 awards to organizations and five $5,000 awards to individuals – for innovations excelling in one of four categories of care. For more information about Maude’s Awards and award categories, visit www.maudesawards.org. Award applications will open March 3, 2020.
The UW Departments of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology are pleased to announce the 2nd annual request for applications for Building Bridges Awards (BBA) for Creating Research Partnerships.
Applications will be funded at a level of $10,000 to $20,000 each. Four applications will be funded, with the potential for 2 more (6 total), depending on the quality and quantity of applications. More information
BEAT-PD (Biomarker and Endpoint Assessment to Track Parkinson’s Disease) DREAM Challenge - $25K in prize money
The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research (MJFF) and Sage Bionetworks have partnered with Evidation Health, Northwestern University, Radboud University Medical Center, and BRAIN Commons to launch the BEAT-PD (Biomarker and Endpoint Assessment to Track Parkinson’s Disease) DREAM Challenge. BEAT-PD is a data challenge designed to benchmark new methods to predict Parkinson’s disease severity. Winners from the Challenge will share a $25,000 prize.
More Information from SageBio
Register for the Challenge Submissions to the BEAT-PD Challenge are due by April 22, 2020.
The winning team and a runner-up will be announced in May 2020.
Resources
Accelerating Medicines Partnership launches data knowledge portal for Parkinson’s disease
The Accelerating Medicines Partnership (AMP) program for Parkinson’s disease (PD) has launched a data portal to provide de-identified information collected from 4,298 PD patients and healthy controls to researchers working to develop effective therapies for the disease. The portal enables researchers to study complex data sets and perform genome-wide analyses at a scale previously impossible.
Using ADRC and Related Resources
The ADRC has a new website page for researchers. We hope to help researchers, especially those new to the ADRD field, effectively utilize these rich resources and expertise in basic and translation science, clinical and population/epidemiological research, big data and animal models.
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March 2, 4 pm - 5 pm
ADRC Toward Precision Medicine Symposium: Native Peoples and the All of Us Research Program: Inclusion, Collaboration, Governance, and Benefit (Flyer)
Speaker: Dr. Spero Manson (Pembina Chippewa), Distinguished Professor, Public Health and Psychiatry/ Director, Centers for American Indian and Alaska Native Health/ Associate Dean of Research, Colorado School of Public Health, University of Colorado Denver’s Anschutz Medical Center.
Location: Pat Steele Building, Harborview Medical Center, Room 2005
*Of interest to researchers and students.
March 3 - 5
Hindsight 2020 is a meeting featuring the latest insights from researchers in the fields of cell lineage and developmental recording, chaired by Jay Shendure, M.D., Ph.D. and Michael Elowitz, Ph.D., of the Allen Discovery Center at UW Medicine.
Location: Allen Institute, 615 Westlake Avenue N. Seattle, WA 98109
Learn more and apply to attend
*Of interest to researchers and students.
March 11, 1:30 pm - 2:30 pm
UW Pathology Grand Rounds (Flyer)
Title: “Resistance and Resilience to Alzheimer's Disease: Pathology in a Community-Based Cohort
Presenter: Caitlin Latimer, MD, PhD, Acting Instructor, Department of Pathology, University of Washington
Location: UW Medical Center, 1959 NE Pacific St, Seattle, WA 98195. Room NE110
This lecture can also be viewed via teleconference: HMC: 2NJ251, VA: BD152, SCCA: G-3102, SCH: OC.8.723
*Of interest to researchers and students.
April 1, 7:30am – 4:00pm
Discovery Conference 2020 (health care professionals)
The Alzheimer’s Association Washington State Chapter volunteers, staff, Discovery 2020 sponsors, exhibitors and presenters, are proud to offer an enriching day of evidence-based education, professional growth, resources and networking opportunities, for health care professionals. MBWC's Dr. Kris Rhoads, PhD, will be a speaker, as well as UW's Tatiana Sadak, PhD, and Susan McCurry, PhD.
Location: Lynnwood Convention Center, 3711 196th St SW, Lynnwood, WA 98036
*Of interest to healthcare professionals
Flyer
Register
April 24, 9:00 a.m
The Alzheimer’s Disease Research Network of Washington State
UPCOMING MEETING - Quarterly Teleconference:
Contact: Jamie Teuteberg at jamie.teuteberg@hca.wa.gov
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SAVE THE DATE!
8th Annual ACT Research Symposium
August 17-18, 2020
Washington State Convention Center
Please save the date for the 2020 ACT Symposium! The registration website and call for abstracts will open in April 2020.
Funding for this conference was made possible, in part by 1R13AG057087-01 from NIA.
For any questions, please contact at KPWA.ACTproposals@kp.org
13TH Clinical Trials on Alzheimer's Disease (CTAD) -
November 4-7, 2020 - Boston, MA More info
International LBD Conference
Researchers interested in Lewy Body Dementia can plan far in advance for the next International LBD Conference, to be held June 16-18, 2021 in Newcastle upon Tyne, U.K
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