Two Blues Join Forces to Fight Alzheimer’s Disease

If doctors could catch the first signs of Alzheimer’s disease in the brain earlier, could the disease be delayed or even prevented?

This is the question that researchers at Duke and UNC are hoping to answer by joining forces on an ambitious new program called the Alzheimer’s Disease Research Collaborative (ADRC). The Duke-UNC collaborative includes experts from a dozen disciplines, from neurology to bioinformatics to pathology.

Heather Whitson, MD, MHS and Gwenn Garden, MD, PhD

​“The bold 10-year-vision is that this collaborative group will transform dementia care and research opportunities for people all across eastern North Carolina,” said Heather Whitson, MD, MHS, professor of medicine (Geriatrics) and ophthalmology, and director of the Duke Center for the Study of Aging and Human Development. Whitson is co-leading the effort with UNC’s Gwenn Garden, MD, PhD, professor of neurology and chair of UNC’s Department of Neurology.

“It makes sense that by working together we can achieve our goals more effectively than if we were competing against each other or trying to do it on our own,” co-director Garden said. She noted that there is already a lot of collaborative brain research going on between the two schools, including cutting-edge work around brain imaging.