Do you remember those videos on Facebook where Mark Zuckerberg, Neymar, Valesca Popozuda and Gisele Bündchen, among other celebrities, threw buckets of ice over their heads? The Ice Bucket Challenge has only lasted three years.
The newsroom in Brazil knew what lies behind this phenomenon.
The Ice Bucket Challenge was the successor to the Cold Water Challenge, which dates back to March 2012. The goal of the challenge is to raise funds to study Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis, a disease Rare, dangerous and so far unhealed. The famous British astronomer Stephen Hawking carries this disease; He became a symbol of persistence, suffering from ALS since the 1960s when he was 20 years old.
Whatever the technical origin of the challenge (why necessarily throw ice water?), He made an important contribution to fighting the disease.
The essay contacted Dr. Dora Brites, from the Medical Research Institute of the University of Lisbon (iMed.ULisboa). Responding to the question, which could not be left unanswered, about whether the challenge in social networks may actually have helped medicine, she said the following:
"Not only does it make the disease better known, it also makes it possible to have funds for research, whose innovation lies in the possibility of using more sophisticated and costly techniques, demanding more resources, especially since many causes are suspected and This is the need for the production of varied treatments whose efficacy has to be proven in clinical trials. Compared to Alzheimer's disease, ALS is clearly an underfunded disease.
She said there is an organization, the American Association for ALS (ALSA), which "has a higher budget today that allows it to fund a larger set of research projects aimed at finding new therapies and their Clinical trials ".
"However, the available budget is still very limited and the research that is being developed is struggling with the scarcity of resources. The awareness of society is surely a necessary aid," says Dora Brites.
Awareness and awareness is missing in this area, which remains in almost total darkness.
"Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) is a rapidly evolving, difficult to identify and fatal disease of unknown origin and as such without effective therapy. The disease involves the degeneration of motor neurons (NMs) that control voluntary movements, causing bankruptcy Respiratory failure due to paralysis of the diaphragm.
Although there is a selective vulnerability of NMs, it is considered that ALS is a multi-system disease involving several regions of the nervous system in addition to those associated with motor activity, "says the researcher.
Being a "multi-system" disease, it can probably be beaten with "multi-target" drugs, the scientist suggests.
In a recent interview with the Portuguese daily newspaper Diário de Notícias, Dr. Dora Brites mentioned that "in 90% of sporadic forms, ignorance of what leads to the onset of the disease is total." That is, we only know 10% of the factors that can cause ALS. ALS is capable of causing atrophy of all muscles, which leads to death.
An active project of which Dora Brites is now participating, funded by the Santa Casa da Misericórdia de Lisboa (50 thousand euros each year in 2016 and 2017), aims to bring more light to this mystery.
"With the discovery of new human models to study the disease, based on patients' skin cells and their derivation in the so-called induced pluripotent stem cells capable of generating neurons, astrocytes and microglia, I believe the coming years will bring great And other neurodegenerative diseases.These cells can be produced in three-dimensional systems and inserted into mice, creating advanced models of the disease and facilitating the discovery of the mechanisms that are at the origin of cell dysfunction. Can be produced from cells of several individuals with the disease, which will provide a patient-directed or personalized medicine. On the other hand, these once corrected cells may be transplanted into the Patient, treating 'their disease' and avoiding the use of Because they are their own cells, "explains the doctor.
Research continues, but "nothing has yet been proven of the factors that may be predisposing" to make a person vulnerable to the disease, says Dora Brites.
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