Featured Articles
August 2009: Lewy bodies spread as Lewy body disease progresses, but the mechanism was not known. Scientists have now determined that alpha-synuclein, the protein Lewy bodies are composed of, spreads from cell to cell.
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January 2009: Lewy bodies kill brain cells, but the mechanism was not known. Scientists think they have now identified the mechanism. Also, new research supports the finding that a kind of sleep disorder is related to the probability of developing LBD.
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April 2008: Thomas Graboys, a Boston cardiologist and Harvard professor, published his memoir
Life in the Balance: A Physician's Memoir of Life, Love, and Loss with Parkinson's Disease and Dementia.
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August 2007: Kathie Lee Gifford revealed that her father, who died in 2002, had LBD. She left her popular TV show in 2000 to be with him. Also, actress Estelle Getty has LBD.
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May 2007: Researchers have made discoveries that could help diagnose or predict LBD. First, people with an extreme form of sleep disorder have a high probability of getting LBD or Parkinson's disease. Second, researchers are trying to develop a blood test for Parkinson's, which could also apply to LBD. Third, people with LBD tend to experience passive personality changes.
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July 2006: Researchers found that a mutation in a particular gene correlates with the occurrence of Lewy body disease. Of the patients tested, 23% had the mutation. The same gene is involved in a rare illness called Gaucher disease.
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February 2006: Otis Chandler, longtime publisher of the
Los Angeles Times, died at age 78 from Lewy body disease. In his 20 years as publisher, he transformed the paper into one of the country's best.
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June 2005: Scientists at the University of California at San Diego created a vaccine consisting of the protein that forms Lewy bodies. Vaccinated mice developed antibodies that reduced the Lewy body protein levels.
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January 2005: After a three-year bout with Lewy body disease, Robert Heilbroner, one of the most influential economic historians of the 20th century, died at age 85.
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