In Fiscal Year 2007, our role as a catalyst for breakthrough dementia research was exemplified in our commitment to provide knowledge-sharing forums for leading dementia researchers.

Clinical studies are vital to the development of new treatments for Alzheimer's

William Thies, Ph.D., vice president of Medical and Scientific Relations with the Alzheimer's Association.

"There are a number of large clinical trials being done for new drugs for the treatment of Alzheimer's disease. They have the potential to really change the course of this disease." View video -->

In response to a critical shortage of clinical trial volunteers, we launched a clinical trials initiative. The first phase, being piloted in five cities, is designed to:

• educate physicians about the shortage of volunteers for clinical studies and encourage them to refer patients
• raise public awareness about clinical studies and the need for volunteers using public relations, paid advertising, and grassroots and minority/ethnic outreach strategies

ICAD drew scientific leaders from around the world

ICAD provided a forum for researchers around the world and generated 142 million media impressions.

In July 2006, 5,000 researchers gathered in Madrid, Spain, for the Alzheimer’s Association International Conference on Alzheimer’s Disease (ICAD), where leading Alzheimer scientists shared groundbreaking information on the etiology, pathology and treatment of Alzheimer’s and related dementias. In July 2008, ICAD will take place in Chicago.

The Alzheimer's Association International Conference on Prevention of Dementia in Washington, D.C., convened more than 1,000 international Alzheimer experts to present and discuss the advances in early detection, diagnosis and intervention. Studies released at the conference included the newest statistics on global Alzheimer prevalence, which indicated that researchers currently estimate some 26 million people have Alzheimer’s worldwide.

Preliminary data from the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) was also released at our Prevention conference. Findings indicated that Alzheimer researchers may be able to streamline the clinical trial process for drug testing, as well as find ways to improve imaging and detection methods, which may lead to better treatments and timelier diagnoses.

In Fiscal Year 2007, our annual research grant program funded a total of about $21.6 million in research initiatives, including 109 awards to individual investigators. Funded projects represent the proposals ranked highest by their peer reviewers in an extremely competitive field of 639 applications.

The Alzheimer's Association Zenith Society awards funding to some of the most creative and cutting-edge research studies in Alzheimer science. In May 2007, Society members stepped up their leadership and voted to increase the Zenith awards for the 2008 grant cycle from a 2-year, $250,000 award to a 3-year, $450,000 commitment. Members also expanded the Zenith Society to include donors who support the full mission of the Association – care and research.

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