[maxst]

>Most of the major pharmaceutical companies continue to pursue the amyloid and tau pathways. Dementia Discovery Fund complements their work by supporting startups as they explore less mainstream approaches to treating dementia.

That's very encouraging. Because what if it's something else?

[Filligree]

The amyloid and tau pathways are our best hope of finding a simple solution, something we can reasonably fix with drugs.

If it's something else, then chances are good it'll be far harder to fix, perhaps even requiring genetic engineering or medical nanotechnology. Finding out is still valuable, of course...

[gerbilly]

> our best hope of finding a simple solution

You hit the nail on the head, and I think you bring up an interesting point.

Ask anyone who has a condition stigmatized by the medical community, say chronic fatigue, about how the medical system reacts to their symptoms.

You will find that in a many cases, doctors will try to deny the existence of the disease. I think this is because it is so complicated as to elude a 'simple solution'.

Perhaps our doctors and medical researchers, are too predisposed to look for simple solutions in these cases, because that approach worked so well in the past.

Maybe we've picked all the low hanging fruit, and now it's time to tackle the tougher problems, using a more system-wide approach.

We seem to be stuck in the mindset of: single disease/single cause/single solution.

[hprotagonist]

We’re batting 000 on drugs that target amyloid or tau, and not for want of trying.

[Filligree]

Fortunately, we have enough resources to try multiple approaches.

I'm happy that we're doing so. For a very long time this was treated as just a fact of life, immutable.

[JamesBarney]

Why do you think this? Why couldn't it be as simple as stimulating glial cells?

[Filligree]

I'm not a medical researcher. Maybe it could be.

I'm basing my statements mainly on what I've heard from people who are, and I've yet to hear about glia cells. If any easily fixable cause turns out to be the truth, then I'll be happy.