The Clinical Research Support Core (Core B) provides carefully diagnosed and evaluated patients for ADRC related projects and manages and analyzes data obtained from these patients. The four sites at which core B operates are the Mount Sinai Medical Center, the Bronx Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Elmhurst General Hospital, and the Jewish Home and Hospital for the Aged. The Clinical Research Support Core has two sections, one for patient recruitment and the other for data management and statistics. The patient recruitment section identifies patients who are eligible for clinical studies, refers patients to the staff of appropriate research projects, and insures that patients are followed longitudinally to autopsy. Patients are recruited for the following projects: 1) the Beta A4, Functional Assessment, and Neuroimaging studies (Projects #1,2, and 4) and the Complement pilot project proposed in this application; 2) Alzheimer's Disease Cooperative Studies Unit projects, (i.e., the selegiline/tocopherol trial, the instrument protocol, the behavioral treatment study, and the prednisone trial); 3) the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's Disease projects; and 4) some comparison groups for the program project grant (AG02219) on early dementia. The cohorts necessary for these studies include patients who meet NINCDS/ADRDA criteria for Alzheimer's disease, patients with cognitive impairment who do not meet criteria for dementia at initial evaluation, nondemented controls, first degree relatives of Alzheimer's probands, and family informants. Longitudinal follow-up is provided to determine subjects' continued eligibility for study, to measure disease progression, and to obtain a positive intent to autopsy. Since patients at different sites are followed in many protocols over long periods of time, centralized data management is essential. Our center has established an efficient system for centralized data management that will be expanded somewhat over the next five years. As in the past, statistical advice will be provided to ADRC investigators at all stages of protocol development and data analysis.
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