Parkinson's Insights

EP 40 - A Faster Way to Find New Treatments for Parkinson’s?

In Episode 40 of Parkinson Weekly, Prof. Bas Bloem explores what he describes as one of the most exciting and encouraging developments in Parkinson’s clinical research: multi-arm, multi-stage (MAMS) clinical trial platforms.As our understanding of the biological processes underlying Parkinson’s disease continues to grow, so too does the number of potential treatments that could target these mechanisms and potentially slow disease progression. The challenge is how to test these promising therapies quickly, efficiently and reliably.Traditional clinical trials can take years, require large numbers of participants and often need a separate placebo group for every treatment being investigated. MAMS platforms offer a different approach, allowing several potential treatments to be tested simultaneously against a shared control group.Crucially, these platforms also incorporate planned interim analyses. Treatments showing little or no evidence of benefit can be stopped early and replaced by new candidates, while those showing promising signals can continue through the trial. The aim is to reduce costs, make better use of participants and, most importantly, identify promising therapies more quickly.Prof. Bloem discusses how this approach has already been successfully used in areas such as cancer and COVID-19, and looks at the growing international movement to bring the same model to neurological diseases.For Parkinson’s disease, he highlights the Edmond J. Safra Accelerating Clinical Trials in Parkinson’s Disease (EJS ACT-PD) platform in the UK, alongside similar initiatives emerging internationally. He also discusses some of the treatments being evaluated through these new trial approaches, including telmisartan, terazosin and UDCA.The episode also considers the challenges involved, from selecting appropriate placebo groups to identifying sensitive biomarkers that can provide an early indication of whether a treatment is working.While these platforms will not change clinical care tomorrow, Prof. Bloem explains why they represent genuine hope for the Parkinson’s community: a smarter, faster and more collaborative way of determining which potential treatments deserve to move forward.Could this new generation of clinical trials help accelerate the search for disease-modifying treatments in Parkinson’s?Have a question you’d like Bas to answer in a future episode? Email us at parkinsonweekly@gmail.com – we’d love to hear from you.

EP 39 - Can Blue Light Therapy Improve Sleep in Parkinson’s Disease?

🎙️ We’re back with the 39th episode of Parkinson Weekly, hosted by Prof. Bas Bloem - on this week’s episode, Prof. Bas Bloem explores an intriguing new approach to one of the most common challenges faced by people with Parkinson’s disease: poor sleep.Could something as simple as blue light therapy make a difference?Prof. Bloem discusses a recent placebo-controlled study investigating blue light delivered through specially designed glasses in people with Parkinson’s experiencing sleep problems. Participants received either blue or red light therapy for two weeks, with the results showing a significantly greater improvement in sleep quality and daytime sleepiness among those receiving blue light.In this episode, Prof. Bloem explores:Why blue light may help regulate the body’s biological clock and sleep–wake cycleThe improvements seen in sleep quality and daytime sleepinessWhy the lack of improvement in motor symptoms may actually strengthen the findingsThe potential for blue light therapy as an easy, home-based interventionWhy larger and longer Phase III studies are still needed before it can become an established treatmentWhile the study involved only 30 participants and further research is required, the findings offer an encouraging glimpse at a potentially safe, non-invasive way of improving sleep for people living with Parkinson’s disease.Have a question you’d like Bas to answer in a future episode? Email us at parkinsonweekly@gmail.com – we’d love to hear from you.

At the UF Health Fixel DBS Think Tank today we start with a clean slate. The meeting is being held in the "Swamp" where the gators play football. Turns out they are also starting fresh today. Meeting also public by zoom.

Today we launch the 14th annual DBS Think Tank at UF Health and the Fixel Institute. What better way to start than by looking back at what we learned last year? DBS is deep brain stimulation, a therapy that uses implanted electrodes to modulate specific brain circuits. Chance Fleeting and colleagues captured the discussions from last year’s DBS Think Tank XIII in a newly published proceedings paper in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience. The meeting brought together clinicians, scientists, engineers, industry, ethicists and folks living w/ neuromodulation devices to debate where DBS is headed. Key points: - DBS is rapidly moving from simply asking where to stimulate toward understanding who to stimulate, when to stimulate and how to personalize therapy using brain networks and biomarkers. - Adaptive and activity-dependent DBS may allow stimulation to change in real time based on walking, symptoms and brain state, opening new possibilities for gait and other difficult-to-treat symptoms. - The future is bigger than technology. Ethics, access, post-trial responsibility, patient-centered outcomes, genetics and partnerships between academia and industry must evolve alongside the devices. My take: The DBS Think Tank has never been about everyone agreeing. It is about putting smart and passionate folks in the same room, debating what we know, challenging what we think we know and identifying what we need to do next. As we launch year 14 today, the field is shifting from stimulating a spot in the brain toward understanding and modulating circuits and networks in the right person at the right time. Here are 5 points that resonated w/ me: 1- The future of DBS will be increasingly personalized. 2- Closed-loop and adaptive systems are moving from concept toward clinical reality. 3- Brain networks may matter as much as traditional anatomical targets. 4- Innovation must be paired w/ access, ethics and responsibility to the folks receiving these devices. 5- The most important advances will likely emerge when persons w/disease, clinicians, neuroscientists, engineers and industry challenge each other and work together.