welcome to the organic green doctor blog

i am a family physician who was diagnosed with
early mild cognitive impairment(mci) amnestic type on december 21, 2010
this is a precursor to alzheimers disease
because of this diagnosis i have opted to stop practicing medicine
this blog will be about my journey with this disease
please feel free to follow me along this path
i will continue blogging on organic gardening, green living,
solar power, rainwater collection, and healthy living
i will blog on these plus other things noted to be interesting

Wednesday, August 26, 2020

my story revisited #54-wichita lineman and more studies

 MY STORY REVISITED #54-WICHITA LINEMAN AND MORE STUDIES
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glenn campbell died in the final stages of alzheimers disease in 2017 at the age of 81
i watched him at the grammys then later in his documentary called ill be me
you could see the changes that occurred since then
it was painful to watch at times
he lived five more years after the grammys

back in 2012 the research was being started on the antibodies to the amyloid studies
the theory was the antibodies would bind to the amyloid and remove the amyloid from the brain
and
if you removed the amyloid you might slow down the disease

originally the antibody drugs were given to folks with moderate alzheimers with not good results
later they started giving them to folks with early alzheimers then later mci (mild cognitive impairment) folks then now they are giving it to prealzheimers folks who have positive biomarkers but no symptoms yet
the thinking is that the earlier in the disease process it is given the more likely it is to slow down the disease
those studies are ongoing now and we should eventually know if that approach will really work

my drug biogens aducanumab an antibody against the amyloid deposited in the brain was used in the study i was in in folks with mci and early alzheimers disease 
it appears it may help to slow down the disease in that study
they are awaiting fda approval for its use
it wasnt long after the grammy show that campbell was at that i identified the aducanumab and other studies to start following closely through the research world

i eventually identified the biogen aducanumab as the one with the best chance of working
i may have guessed correctly

i eventually about 5 years later got 18 months of placebo then 7 months of the real drug
enough i hope to help slow it down some
i hope to restart the aducanumab when they reactivate the treatment studies

we all though are trying to do all the healthy things one needs to do
right now thats the best we can do to slow it down unless like me you get into one of these research treatment studies like i did
__________

02-17-2012
WICHITA LINEMAN IS STILL ON THE LINE

watched glen campell at the grammys sing
he did a good job singing
but
seemed a little lost when he finished

he is in i think stage 4 alzheimers
he probably doesnt drive
he probably couldnt use his phone and call someone
he would not do well on the simple mmse test thats given
in many doctors office and would do less well on the moca or
more advanced neuropsychological testing
he may not know what day it is what time it is whos president
his address his phone number but

he was able to sing his old songs without a problem
the brain does funny things doesnt it
if youve been around alzheimers patients you know they will
sometimes be able to do things like singing a song they wrote
and had sung it a lot over the years then not be able to tie their shoes

the cruelty of this disease

good job glen campbell we wish you the best
keep it up as long as you can

MORE STUDIES
since what i have may be very early alzheimers disease i keep up
with as many new studies or articles on alzheimers as i can
i know if i have the big a then i have a window of time where if
something comes along it can help me
if the disease progresses too much so much damage is done its
unrepairable

two companies are doing phase 11 and phase 111 studies on their
version of the alzheimers vaccine
basically antibodies bind to beta amyloid-the culprit thought to be the
cause of alzheimers disease or the end result of whatever the process
is that causes it-
these antibodies-betamyloid are then removed from the brain
its not a 100% effective product
it may be only 25% effective
only some of those treated will get improvement
some will have side effects
on apoe 4 genotypes like i have the vaccine may not be as effective
and more side effects are noted

time will tell

air pollution exposure may spend up the development of alzheimers
studies showed that in some the exposure to higher levels of pollution
could increase the rate of cognitive decline by up to 2 years

am glad i live in the country where there is good fresh air
another good reason to live in the country

another study showed that sleep deprivation can lead to
cognitive decline
ever tried to take a test after staying up all night studying
thats a simple test

those patients with sleep disturbances had increased levels of
that bad old beta amyloid

another reason to have a good night sleep

add a good restful sleep to your bucket list along with exercise
good diet cholesterol control blood pressure control and
normal weight
__________
so what was recommended in 2012 is still the same that is recomended today to decrease your chances of getting alzheimers or of slowing down the symptoms

now hopefully soon we might be able to add an antibody treatment like the aducanumab to help slow it down if it gets fda approval
there are others that are also being studied now that my help some

the organicgreen doctor

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