What Did I Want in the Refrigerator?
Next Monday will be my 66th birthday and while I think my mind is as sharp as it used to be when I was a spring chicken of 55, I sometimes find myself forgetting where I put my keys or why I went over to the refrigerator. These small lapses are not new. I have been searching for my keys and sometimes trying to remember why I went to the refrigerator most of my life, but as I get older, I wonder if it is happening more and if it might mark some beginning of "oldtimer's disease."
Now contrary to what some young people believe, I know that anyone can have moments of forgetfulness, especially when they are busy, and that even 90 year-olds can sometimes be sharper than those half their age.
For instance, at the funeral of my great aunt Nora, who lived to 95, the minister told about a spelling contest that he had conducted at the senior center just a few months before. He had thought that Nora spelled one word wrong, but she said, "I was a teacher most of my life and I know how it is spelled." When he looked it up in the dictionary, she was right and he was wrong. Yes, Nora, along with most of my other older relatives, remained sharp as a tack, even into her 90s.
I also have had experience with seeing some older friends of the family cope with the ravages of Alzheimer's in their 80s and 90s, so I am following with interest research in creating radiopharmaceuticals to image the amyloid plaques that are associated with, and may be the cause of, Alzheimer's disease.
That is why I was attracted to a press release today from the University of Pittsburgh noting that William E. Klunk, MD, PhD, and Chester A. Mathis PhD, were awarded the 2008 Potamkin Prize at today's annual meeting of the American Academy of Neurology in Chicago. Considered by some as the "Nobel Prize of Neurology," the award is given to researchers who have made outstanding contributions to the study of Alzheimer's disease and related dementias. Dr. Klunk and Dr. Mathis won for their work on the Pittsburgh compound, an targeted Alzheimer's plaque imaging agent.
The $100,000 prize, which will be shared between the Pittsburgh researchers and Clifford R. Jack Jr. MD of the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, will be used toward continuing Alzheimer's research, according to the press release.
It makes me proud as a nuclear medicine technologist that nuclear medicine and PET is leading the way in helping to diagnose Alzheimer's, hopefully at an earlier stage, where it might be controlled or even cured. I am also optimistic that by having imaging agents that can quantify changes in plaque deposits, researchers will soon be able to find treatments to delay, or even block, the formation of these plaques.
It gives me hope that, when I reach my 90s, there will be treatments available that will help me keep my mind as sharp as my Aunt Nora's was.