Monday, May 05, 2008
Immunotherapy for Alzheimer's disease, commonly known as "the Alzheimer's Vaccine" has generated considerable excitement in both the Alzheimer's disease research community and among patients and caregivers. The basic logic of the approach is that it is possible to use the body's own immune syst...
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Thanks so much for your post Doctor and Welcome Aboard. The information you've provided our community members on vaccinaton seem very promising. I am hopeful they will have successful enough results in July that will allow for a larger scale "next step".
Please keep us informed as you find out more on this research.
Members can find more information on current treatment and prevention practices for Alzheimer's Disease and dementia on our site.
All the best, sue (moderator)
My wife was part of this study with bapineuzumab. She finished the first double-blind phase. We still don't know if she was in the control or medicated group. She has had 3 seizures since February this year. She was just getting started in the se cond phase, extended study wherein everyone got the actual medicine. After the last seizure we were told she could no longer be in the extended study.
So far different tests ( MRI, EEG,CT scan, EKG, Heart monitoring) haven't shown what is the cause of the seizures. Now we are faced with the problem of how to deal with the seizures. She is on Dilantin but it has such strong side effects it is scary.
I'm so sorry! That's the difficult part of a study when a loved one is the patient. No one knows if the medicine is being used or not. This is, of course, a necessary step in the process, but tough for the people who have disease.
If you haven't read the article on Alzheimer's drug trials, you may find it interesting. Bapineuzumab failed the first of four trials.
The side effects from Dilantin can be scary. Seizures can be part of the later stage of dementia. I hope that there is a better way to control them than Dilantin to control the seizures. Some of the newer anti-seizure drugs have fewer side effects, or so I'm told. I'd ask the doctor to try something different unless he has a specific reason for Dilantin.
Take care of yourself as well as your wife,
Carol