The following is the text that appeared in the August issue of "Healthy
Cells" magazine which si publisheed here in Peoria, IL. Dr. Rick and I
happen to be on the cover and the focus of severaal insidde pagges. Dr.
Rick is  Dr. Richard J. Weber, Ph.D
Associate Professor of Imnuopharmacology and Microbiology
Dept. of Biomedical & Therapeutic Sciences
University Of Illinois Medical School-Peoria campus
One Illini Drive
P.O. box 1649
Peoria, IL 61656-1649

Dr. Rick Weber In press "Healthy Cells" August 2001 Parkinson's Disease
Nationwide, as many as 1.5 million people suffer from Parkinson's,
according to the Parkinson's Disease Foundation. Though the disease is
found most often in patients over 50 years of aae, as many as 10 percent
of patients afflicted with the so-called "young- onset" Parkinson's are
under 40 years. About 50,000 Americans are diagnosed with Parkinson's
yearly, according to the National Institute of Neurological Disorders
and Stroke, which estimates that the total cost of health care for
Parkinson's patients will exceed $5.6 billion this year.

 The disease is not fatal, but it reduces longevity. It also seriously
impairs the quality of life and may sometimes lead to severe incapacity
within 10 to 20 years. Parkinson's Disease is a life sentence, not a
death sentence.

 What Is Parkinson's Disease?

Parkinson's Disease is a slow, progressive disorder that affects
movement, muscle control, and balance,. It occurs when cells are
destroyed in certain parts of the base of the brain, where they send out
fibers to other brain regions. An essential neurotransmitter (a chemical
messenger in the brain) called dopamine is released in those regions.
Dopamine is one of three major neurotransmitters known as
catecholamines, which help the body respond to stress and prepare it for
the fight-or-flight response. Loss of dopamine in certain brain recions
is the primary defect in Parkinson's Disease. This loss negatively
effects the nerves and muscles controlling movement and coordination,
resultin- in the major symptoms characteristic of Parkinson's Disease,
including tremor, rigidity and a loss of the ability to initiate
controlled movement.
During the late 1950s Dr. Arvid Carlsson studied experimental animals
that had lost their ability to perform spontaneous movements. He then
treated the animals with L-dopa (Sinemet), a precursor of dopamine,
which is transformed to dopamine in the brain. The symptoms disappeared
and the animals resumed their normal motor behavior. Carlsson realized
that the symptoms in the animals he studied were similar to the syndrome
of Parkinson's Disease. This led, in turn, to the finding that Parkinson
patients have abnormally low concentrations of dopamine in certain brain
regions. As a consequence, L-dopa was developed as a drug against
Parkinson's Disease and today still is the most important treatment for
the disease. Testimony to the importance of his work ahd discoveries and
in recognition of advances in the understanding of Parkinson's disease
was Carlsson's receipt of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine this
year.

Current Treatments and Procedures

Drug treatments are increasingly effective in alleviating symptoms and
even slowing progression of the disease. Over time, however, the side
effects of many of these medications can be nearly as distressing as the
disease itself, and the drugs may eventually lose their effectiveness.

Surgical procedures may be appropriate for some patients when drug
therapy no longer works. The neurosurgeon drills a small hole into the
skull and inserts an electrode, which generates a current and heat to
destroy small amounts of tissue in certain brain i-e-ions responsible
for many Parkinson's symptoms. Suraical techniques do not cure the
disease, however, and the primary benefit is to allow people to continue
on L-dopa without incurring its side effects.

 Future Outlook

 What about transplanting a brain? Although farfetched, it is possible
to implant cells into brain regions. Experimental approaches, which hold
promise, involved the surgical implantation of brain cells'rich in
dopamine to replace those cells which are lost. Fetal cells are the most
appropriate tissue since they survive well and have the capacity to
develop in the brain. A recent study by Freed and colleagues published
in the New England Journal of Medicine showed mixed success using this
technique, with only a few patients improving and, in some patients, the
symptoms actually worsened. Four fetuses were needed to treat each
patient. At 50,000 new cases per year and 1.5 million current cases, the
use of fetal tissue to treat the disease is not logistically feasible.
In addition, there are vexing moral issues surrounding the use of fetal
tissue.

Another approach is to stimulate the brain to heal itself or regenerate
the lost dopamine producing cells. Up until about 15 years ago the
"dogma" was that once the brain or nerve cells were lost, they were gone
forever. Common sense dictates that this is false, since, if it were so,
how would we experience new memories, think new ideas, or learn. The
brain must have the capacity for generation and, therefore,
regeneration. In recent years several "growth factors" have been
identified and are being tested in experimental animal models of
Parkinson's Disease as well as other neurodegenerative diseases.

Recently, a group at Rush Presbyterian St. Luke's Medical Center in
Chicago led by Dr Jeffery Kordower delivered a growth factor gene
carried by a virus directly into the vulnerable brain areas in monkeys
with experimental Parkinson's Disease. Improvement was seen in the
growth factor treated animals but not in the control group. Although
promising, there are also problems that have been seen with other
experimental 'gene therapy' trials. Many people are concerned about
eating genetically modified foods, let alone being injected with a
genetically modified virus.

Several years ago while working at the Surgical Neurology Branch,
National Institutes of Health in Bethesda Maryland my colleagues Drs.
Robert Plunkett, Scott Ewing and Alois Zauner tried a different approach
to treat Parkinson's Disease. Plunkett was working with me to develop
surgical techniques and cell handling procedures to maximize survival
and function of transplanted cells into brain.'In the course of
experimental implantation of cells into brain, we frequently noted an
infiltration of leukocytes into the implantation site. Leukocytes or
white cells are cells of the immune system and frequently thought of as
important in protecting us from infections. However, another role of
white cells is wound healing and removal and repair of effete or
senescent tissue.

I We reasoned that the presence of the cell infiltrate may be partly
responsible for the behavior and motor improvement seen in our models of
Parkinson's Disease. I said, "Let's do the experiment!" As the
"neuroimmunologist" of the group it was my responsibility to provide the
cells for implantation. Plunkett would implant them into the brain
regions depleted of cells making dopamine. I decided to produce a mild
inflammation in the peritoneal cavity of a rat, harvest the cells and
use these for implantation into several rats with experimental
Parkinson's Disease. Within a week the animals receiving activated
leukocytes be-an to show improvement, continued to  improve and showed
sustained improvement up to thirteen weeks when the experiment was
concluded. Not only did the animals have more dopamine in the depleted
brain regions, but regrowth of the lost cell was evident. We are
currently working on understanding the mechanism of this regeneration
and improving the technique with the eventual goal of treating patients
with Parkinson's Disease. Several advantages of our technique include
the use of the'patient's own cells so there is no graft rejection
problem, availability of tissue for transplantation and eliminating the
moral issues involved as in the use of fetal tissue. Furthermore, the
expense and complexity associated with gene therapy approaches would be
reduced.

 The prospects for the future for the treatment and possible cure for
diseases like Parkinson's are remarkable and only serve to encourage
further research and sustained funding through government and private
sources. Many dedicated scientists working in this area over the last 40
years have brought us to this brink. However, it is the patients
suffering from the disease like Joan Blessington Snyder, Michael J. Fox
and many others, and their couraoe and determination that should be an
inspiration to us all.


If anyone would like to recieve a copy of this magazijne-please send me
your snail mail address. Dr. Weber's reseach is a reciepeint of part of
the money raised from our golf tourntament.  Joan


Joan E. Blessington Snyder    49/11
http://www.geocities.com/joanbsnyder
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"Hang tough.....no way through it but to do it."   Chris-in-the-Morning
on Northern Exposure

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