Public event on dementia to allow dialogue

• By ELLYN COUVILLION
• Advocate staff writer
• Published: Oct 28, 2009 - Page: 1D

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A first-time public forum on dementia research on Nov. 3 at the Pennington Biomedical Research Center will feature experts from across the country — and plenty of time for questions.

At most events, “There’s always about an hour’s worth of questions and 10 minutes to ask them,” said Jeff Keller, Ph.D., director of the Institute for Dementia Research and Prevention at Pennington, which is presenting the free event.

Keller and other organizers have made sure that the public has time to have a dialogue with experts from across the country.

“The panel is comprised of folks who work at or run top-notch Alzheimer’s centers around the country,” Keller said of the speakers scheduled.

“All are researchers and all work with patients, as well,” he said.

The Scientific Conference and Public Forum on Dementia will be held from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. at the C.B. Pennington Jr. building at the Pennington research center, 6400 Perkins Road.

A panel of experts will speak on the latest advances in dementia research, as well as the latest in clinical trials.

A question-and-answer period will follow each of the two panel presentations, and the forum will close with a question-and-answer session from 8 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.

There will also be an opportunity to visit exhibits providing information on dementia.

Panel experts will include Dr. William Markesbery, director of both the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging and the Alzheimer’s Disease Center at the University of Kentucky; Stephen Scheff, Ph.D., associate director of the Sanders-Brown Center on Aging; and Frederick Schmitt, Ph.D., a professor at the center.

Other speakers will include Dr. Lon Schneider, professor at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California, and Dr. Russ Swerdlow, director of the Metabolism in Aging and Neurodegeneration Research Program at the University of Kansas. All of the researchers are members of the external advisory board of the Institute for Dementia Research and Prevention at Pennington, Keller said.

“People who do have Alzheimer’s want to know, ‘Is there anything they can do with a drug or otherwise that will benefit their disease,” Swerdlow said.

“People who don’t have it want to know that and (also) how they can avoid getting it,” he said of the progressive and fatal brain disease.