REPORT FROM DIAN, ST. LOUIS. I’m outside the office of Randall Bateman, M.D., the chief neurologist for the DIAN (Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer’s Network) research at Washington University in St. Louis, Missouri. I’m speaking on the phone to Michelle Gollapali, regional director of the Alzheimer’s Association, Delaware Valley of Pennsylvania, about the details of a meeting in Philadelphia I will be speaking at on April 12.
While I’m talking to Michelle, a cousin who is in line for PS2, the gene that causes early onset Alzheimer’s in our family, describes his experience to Dr. Bateman. The DIAN research is our family’s best hope for a treatment or cure, as it is the hope for all people who have or will get Alzheimer’s.
After my phone call, I return to sit with my cousin, his wife, and Dr. Bateman, but think of my other relatives who live with Alzheimer’s, and those who have died, and those like Aunt Ester who fought valiantly to move our family into research so that future generations have hope. I wish Aunt Ester could know what her children, grandchildren, and nieces and nephews are doing to carry on her work. She would be proud and gratified. Her efforts, and those of this generation, get ever closer to bringing the result she worked and prayed for so steadfastly.
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