Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)

Amyotrophic meaning, “no muscle nourishment” in Greek, lateral meaning where the neurons are in the spinal cord, and sclerosis meaning “scarring.” ALS, often known as “Lou Gehrig’s Disease,” named after the New York Yankee who first brought awareness to the disease in the late 1930’s, is a neurodegenerative disease, which affects the neurons in the brain. The nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord that are responsible for sending and receiving motor signals progressively die off, causing the deterioration of simple motor skills in patients with ALS, such as walking, talking, and eventually speaking and breathing, however thinking is not affected by ALS. Early symptoms cause the person to slowly lose mobility of limbs, but in a matter of a few years, the person loses the mobility of most of their body and will eventually lose the ability to eat and breath, which will ultimately cause death. ALS deteriorates the patient's body, however does not affect the patient's state of mind or sanity while the rest of the body shuts down. People usually get ALS between the ages of 40 and 70. However, there is a growing trend where athletes are getting ALS in their thirties. ALS can be contributed to genetic predisposition, which means that the gene that is responsible for ALS is already in the person’s DNA. In recent studies, however, it was observed that individuals who have had suffered multiple concussions or any other head trauma are

Following the diagnosis of ALS the main goal of treatment is focused at relieving the symptoms. The most important matter in managing ALS patients is that they continually sustain the highest amount of movement and activity as possible and remain comfortable while doing so. Although a cure for ALS has not yet been developed, effective treatments do exist to assist the patients in their fight with the disease. Physicians urge the patients to carry on with their everyday lives doing all the activities and physically exerting themselves as they would normally do. But, they also recommend the patients to limit their amount of physical exertion

The first time I was truly made aware of the influence of ALS was when my previous band director at Waukesha North, Mr. Greg Redner, made the decision to move himself, and his growing family at the time entirely to Texas, where his parents lived, and his father was recently diagnosed with ALS. I began to quickly understand that this disease effects much more than simply a degeneration of the muscle cell's in one's body, but it challenges the roles and responsibilities of the family members and friends that are required to support them. The greatest impact that ALS has on the family specifically is undoubtedly the extremely limited amount of time that the disease allows for not only prognosis medically, but also the transition into living with ALS daily as a normality. In recent years, multiple different types

Imagine you are a 78-year-old man, a beloved professor from Brandeis University. Every day you take notice of the increased difficulty of breathing, more so than the usual, or the out-of-breath feeling from climbing a flight of stairs. About two or three weeks later, you start to feel the muscles in your body cramping up, even while partaking in slight activity, And then you know it’s serious after you gave up dancing. After multiple testing, your results come back and you have ALS, also known as Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

Everyday, an average of 15 people are diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis(ALS) also commonly known as Lou Gehrig's disease. Across the world there are more than 5,600 cases of ALS every year. People all around the world are open to being diagnosed with ALS, it affects people of all ages, races, and gender. Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis has affected millions of families and individuals since 1869. However, what is Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, what does life look like for someone with ALS , and what research is being done for a cure?

Many people don’t know much about ALS; ALS is better known as “Lou Gehrig’s disease”.” ALS is a progressive disease that affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord and the muscles throughout the body”. Musculr Dystrophy Assocation. "Stages of ALS Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis." Muscular Dystrophy Association. N.p., 2014. Web. 01 Nov. There is no clear-cut time frame for how long somebody has after they get diagnosed with this disease. Some peoples symptoms gradually grow over time, others occur rapidly, and then plateau. With this disease there is much care needed. Although there isn’t a cure there are treatments to help slow

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that causes devastating debilitation and raises many ethical questions. Many of these questions revolve around quality of life and end of life issues. ALS, specifically, complicates theses issues because of the natural progression of the disease. Patients gradually loose their ability to move, breath and communicate, while retaining, for the most part, their cognitive function. There is currently no cure for the disease and very little in the forms of treatment options, with the average life span after an ALS diagnosis only about three to five years with a small portion of the population living beyond 10 years. As a result, caring an ASL patient can put a lot of stress on their caregivers. Consequently, there is also the risk to the patients, who wishes can be ignored due to their inability to advocate for themselves.

Remember waking up this morning, ready to get up and start a normal day? Now imagine just waking up, not being able to get up, not even to speak, no longer having a normal day whatsoever without the assistance of someone able to do fulfill those daily routines until the day you die, like brushing your teeth helping you eat and even breath. This is what it’ll feel like to live with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), or better known as Lou Gehrig. ALS is a nervous system disease that weakens muscles and impacts physical function. Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) has another impact on a body, otherwise the brain. CTE affects nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord, subsequently leading interference with function in the neurons. Many people

There are few moments in life seared into your memory so vividly that you can recall the details of that event, even years later. One of those days, for me, was May 29th, 2010. I remember where I was when I got the phone call and who was in the room with me. I remember the clock read 6:57 p.m. For some strange reason, I remember what I was wearing. I also remember that this was the moment my mother told me she had been diagnosed with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), often referred to as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, is a progressive and degenerative neurological disorder that affects the cells in both the brain and the spinal chord and has affected nearly twelve to twenty thousand people, according to Moglia and Margolis (2017). This disease may have a great affect on the musculoskeletal system, the nervous system, as well as the respiratory system. Initially, there is no actual known cause to this disease; however, researchers may have an idea of what may play a possible role including genes. In addition, there are a number of symptoms that may also be experienced in patients with Lou Gehrig’s disease including “slurred speech, weakening grip, clumsiness/unsteadiness, and weakened limbs,” (Moglia &

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a late onset neurological disorder characterized by motor neuron degeneration in brain stem, spinal cord and primary motor cortex. There is no single gene strictly associated with all ALS cases, the disease is thought to be caused by the interaction of many genetic factors as well as environmental influences. Most of ALS patients have no family history of this disease, familiar form accounts for only 5 to 10% and seems to be dominant in most cases. The dominance and high heritability of familiar ALS (FALS) led to identification of several high-risk alleles of few genes (among those, SOD1, FUS, TARDEP, C9ORF72 are the most frequent)

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis is commonly referred to as ALS. This disease is also known to many as Lou Gehrig’s disease. ALS is a disease characterized by the slow death of certain nerve cells in the brain and spine. As described by research done through the Mayo Clinic, nerve cells called motor neurons control the muscles that allow you to move muscles of your body. ALS effects these particular neurons and produce serious neurological effects that can start as muscle weakness that eventually leads to disability and then to death. For some people diagnosed with ALS they may find it difficult to walk, talk, eat food, swallow, and even breathe. These problems can, and will lead to injury, illness, and eventually death. For most people who suffer with ALS, death will occur within three to five years after the first symptoms begin; some people may live for many years beyond that.

Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and Multiple Sclerosis (MS) are neurodegenerative diseases that affect the central nervous system.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) presents as progressive weakening of all the voluntary muscles in the body due to the degradation of motor neurons. It is a severe motor neuron disease (MND) that is usually fatal within 5 years due to arrest of the respiratory muscles [Rowland, 2000]. It is only relatively recently that studies have defined specific gene mutations affecting protein function, giving some hope for finding an effective therapy for ALS. Currently there is no cure or treatment for the disease. Over the last five years discovery of mutations in two genes, transactive response (TAR) DNA-binding protein (TDP-43), so called because of its 43-kDa mass, and fused in sarcoma/transloacted in liposarcoma (FUS/TLS) have shifted research into trying to understand the roles of RNA metabolism in neurodegeneration. This micro-review will try to summarise what is known so far about TDP-43 and FUS/TLS and how they relate to pathogensis of ALS.

Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a neurodegenerative disease that causes loss of motor neurons and progressive weakness including loss of speech(Wijesekera & Leigh, 2009). Its onset typically occurs in the sixth decade of life but rare instances can happen earlier. It can begin as bulbar onset which affects the voice, breathing and speech patterns or limb onset which can begin in the arms or legs (Wijesekera & Leigh, 2009). Roughly 90% of cases of ALS are sporadic and not linked to familial history of the disease(Wijesekera & Leigh, 2009). Once ALS starts it almost always progresses, eventually taking away the ability to walk, dress, write, speak, swallow, and breathe and shortening the life span. There is no treatment or cure for ALS, however there are a few drugs which have been able to slow the progression of the disease in some patients. As a result affected individuals become “locked in” and unable to communicate. These patients can benefit greatly from the use of a brain computer interface (BCI)(Birbaumer, 2006; Coyle, Ward, Markham, & McDarby, 2004).