In the first decade of the last century, a young German psychiatrist discovered a new disease. But it took the worldwide medical community some seven decades to fully acknowledge the devastating impact of Dr. Alois Alzheimer’s diagnosis. As a result, the “A-word” now has a particularly scary connotation for senior citizens. Perhaps it is because it is normal to experience memory loss as we age.

A recent proposal that Medicare only cover Aduhelm (aducanumab) for patients with Alzheimer’s disease who are enrolled in clinical trials is needlessly restrictive, and will prevent many people from accessing a medication that may be able to help them.

A 2021 research paper authored by Jeffrey Cummings, MD, ScD, and colleagues estimated the cumulative expenditures to fund Alzheimer disease (AD) clinical trials over the past quarter-century and highlighted the numerous failed attempts that continue to plague the field. Overall, excluding the recent approval of aducanumab (Aduhelm; Biogen), there have only been 5 drugs—all for symptomatic treatment only—that have achieved FDA approval for AD since 1995. An estimated $42.5 billion in private expenditures has been sunk into AD clinical trials since then, with phase 3 representing the highest stage for costs of research and development ($24.1B).

Expert clinicians offer their insight on costs of Alzheimer drug development, a new agent for generalized myasthenia gravis, migraine in the emergency department, educational sleep medicine “boot camps”, AES 2021, and more.

The director of the Chambers-Grundy Center for Transformative Neuroscience at the University of Nevada–Las Vegas detailed the steps necessary to lower wasted costs from Alzheimer disease drug development and improve regulatory success.

This year has been a major year in the field of Alzheimer disease (AD), with several promising therapies moving forward and the first FDA approval in almost 2 decades.

It’s called the Chambers-Grundy Center for Transformative Neuroscience at UNLV, and the adjective in the name says it all.

The director of the Chambers-Grundy Center for Transformative Neuroscience at the University of Nevada–Las Vegas discussed new data that highlights wasted expenditures from Alzheimer trials and the importance of understanding their impacts.