UW Medicine receives $6 million from Ellison Foundation to revolutionize care for people with Alzheimer's

Alzheimer's disease, a severe and progressive degenerative condition that leads to dementia, affects millions of people in the U.S. At present, there is no cure. Unless new treatments emerge, the Centers for Disease Control estimates that approximately 13.8 million people in the U.S. will live with Alzheimer's-related dementia by 2050.

With the help of the Ellison Foundation's $6 million investment — especially valuable as the funding from the National Institutes for Health continues its decline — UW Medicine's Alzheimer's Disease Research Center (ADRC) will begin a project unique in the U.S., one that could revolutionize care for Alzheimer's.

Finding treatments for Alzheimer's disease is an outcome the Ellisons are eager to achieve. "We have Alzheimer's in our family, so the issue is quite personal," says Sue Ellison. "But it's also a huge public health issue, and we need to make progress on it. Tom and I hope that UW Medicine can really help move the field forward."

The Alzheimer's Disease Research Center at UW Medicine celebrates its 30^th anniversary in 2015, and no other ADRC possesses the three elements UW Medicine brings to the table for moving the field forward: research expertise in the genetics of Alzheimer's, expertise in the disease's biomarkers, and a precision-medicine approach to clinical trials.

Precision medicine is the next wave in medical care. In this approach, a patient is assessed — genetically, and in other ways — for the treatments that will work best for their individual condition. It's a valuable concept, especially in complex conditions like Alzheimer's disease.

"Alzheimer's is driven by genetics, but it isn't just one disease," explains Thomas J. Montine, M.D., Ph.D., the chair of the Department of Pathology and director of the UW Medicine Alzheimer's Disease Research Center. "It's a disease that has many different subtypes, and one treatment won't work for everyone. Instead, the goal is to create multiple treatments — and see which ones work best for each patient."

With the Ellison Foundation's gift, researchers at UW Medicine will take important steps in using precision medicine for Alzheimer's disease: from understanding the genes and other factors that drive Alzheimer's, to creating or finding drugs to treat it, and finally to understanding how different patients respond.

"We invested in this research because UW Medicine is uniquely equipped to succeed at it," says Tom Ellison of the Ellison Foundation. "Dr. Montine and his colleagues have done amazing work in Alzheimer's, and their knowledge base will be key in creating the first part of the drug discovery pipeline."

The drug discovery pipeline is shorthand for the years-long process of medical science: the work in the lab; the testing of potential drugs; FDA approval; and, finally, the prescription at the physician's office. With the Ellison Foundation's gift — $6 million out of a $20 million project — UW Medicine intends to improve the drug pipeline by:

Using exome sequencing to identify Alzheimer's risk. UW Medicine's Alzheimer's Disease Research Center will use exome sequencing — a focused type of genomic sequencing — to test patients' genes. Testing will help determine a patient's risk of acquiring the disease.

Testing more drugs, faster. Researchers will use patient-derived stem cells to test potential Alzheimer's-defeating drugs at the Quellos High-throughput Screening Core at UW Medicine, a facility that allows fast and efficient testing.

Recruiting a leader. UW Medicine will recruit a senior scientist to lead the clinical trials team, the group that will, eventually, test drugs in human volunteers.

Finding Alzheimer's earlier. The gift also will help test the efficacy of an imaging tool called fMRI in detecting physiological changes in the brain — ones that may warn of impending Alzheimer's — before dementia develops.

"The Ellison Foundation's gift is giving us a wonderful start — they're funding this first, essential phase of our project," says Paul G. Ramsey, M.D., CEO of UW Medicine. "When we know more about the genetics behind Alzheimer's disease, and more about the drugs that may work on our patients, we'll be able to move on to our second phase: drug testing in clinical trials. And the impact will be global."