Families are central to understanding the role genetics plays in neurodegenerative disease. The Brain Study follows the Framingham Heart Study model in enrolling multiple generations to study how genetics impacts the effect of lifestyle on the disease.
What is Neuroscience?
  • Neuroscience is brain science.
  • Specifically, it is the scientific study of the nervous system.
  • Neuroscientists analyze the biological and chemical processes of the brain and broader nervous system functions

Neuroscience Challenges include Degenerative Brain Disorders, also known as Neurodegenerative Diseases. These include:
  • Alzheimer’s Disease
  • Parkinson’s Disease
  • Frontotemporal Disorders
  • ALS, commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease
  • Multiple Sclerosis
  • Traumatic Brain Injury

Who gets these diseases? How to avoid them?
  • If only scientists knew the answer to these questions.
  • Why does one sibling get it and another not?
  • Current data support a healthy life style throughout life as a primary deterrent
  • It all seems so random—and yet so utterly and painfully destructive.
  • There is a higher incidence of disease in different ethnic populations

What can WE do?
  • This is precisely why we established the Georgetown Neurosciences Foundation—we want to provide physicians the tools to help them find answers and better treatments.
  • What tools are we talking about?
  • A longitudinal multi-generational study—modeled after the successful cardiac health study (The Framingham Heart Study) which has had dramatic results on heart health. The Framingham Study is still ongoing—and has enrolled four generations of participants.
  • The Georgetown Brain Study is modeled for multiple generations for the participant to self-monitor and report via a secure web-based portal from the beginning of the study

More About the Framingham Heart Study
  • This study is a multi-generational research collaboration between the National Institutes of Health, Harvard University, and the people of Framingham, MA.
  • 5,000 Framingham residents signed up originally.
  • Over the last 70 years, this study revolutionized the understanding and treatment of cardiovascular disease by observing human volunteers over generations.
  • This study is now in its fourth generation.

We hope to have the same impact with the Georgetown Brain Health.

The Georgetown Brain Study
  • The primary reason we established the Georgetown Neurosciences Foundation was to provide operational support for the Georgetown Brain Study (GBS)
  • The GBS is currently enrolling multiple generations in a long term study through a web-based portal with the capacity to engage and collect data on a large cohort.
  • Volunteer to participate —we hope that you, your family, and your friends will enroll —sign in to our secure website every 6 months and self-report answers to simple lifestyle questions, cognition, and mood.
  • You will gain ongoing feedback and continuing education on your brain health. The data is what is useful to scientists—not your identity.
  • What type of questions will you answer? Standard demographics like age/gender and then lifestyle-related questions: what your diet generally consists of; if and how much you exercise; what conditions you are currently being treated for; what medications you are on; what you are allergic to. The cognition and mood tests will be short and you will finish everything in 20-30 minutes. If necessary we will have volunteers to help you.

What Research Tells Us
  • Intervention is most effective when an integrated approach to treatment happens early in a disease’s progression.
  • This study will provide support for the best treatments and its timing
  • This study will give participants constant access to the most current education and advances in the neurosciences
  • Longitudinal studies like this one that follow generations of people over time have successfully identified what risk factors cause disease, and what treatments work.
  • This study will start with multiple-generations and use advanced technologies to better identify disease progression and intervention.

Will I Really Make a Difference?
  • Absolutely. Scientists studying Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, ALS, Frontotemporal Disorders, and, Traumatic Brain Injury need all of us to create a robust database to help them understand who might get these diseases and what treatments might be effective for whom.

Why Georgetown, Texas?
  • Georgetown is the perfect place to launch both our Neurosciences Foundation and its Georgetown Brain Health Study. I say “our” because the Foundation is a non-profit (501-C3) and is led by Georgetown community leaders.
  • The City of Georgetown is a retirement destination.
  • Sun City is just one example of a local age-restricted community that caters to the 55+ age group. Surrounding communities will extend the diversity of our subject volunteer population

There is so much science around these issues. Are we working with any other organizations? Yes! We have already engaged with:
  • Dell Medical School, UT Austin
  • Mulva Institute for Neuroscience, Dell Medical School
  • UT Southwestern Medical Center for Depression Research and Clinical Care, Dallas
  • Peter O’Donnell Brain Institute, Dallas
  • John’s Hopkins School of Public Health
  • Numerous National Foundation and Associations

How Can I Help Now?
  1. Please go to our website www.GeorgetownNeuroscienceFoundation.org and click on the SUPPORT link to make a secure tax-deductible contribution.
  2. Subscribe to receive updates.
  3. Tell your friends to join you—all of them, anywhere. The sooner we build our database—the sooner we can provide scientists the tool that they need to make progress treating these diseases.
  4. Participate in the Georgetown Brain Health Study by clicking on that link. Remember, all of your personal (identifying) information stays private. (We will alert you when this function is ready.)