The Rush Alzheimer's Disease Core Center (Rush ADCC; P30AG10161) supports cutting edge and innovative research on the etiology, pathogenesis, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), Alzheimer's disease (AD), and other common conditions of aging, by providing researchers with a stimulating environment, highly valued clinical and post-mortem data, and ante- and post-mortem biologic specimens. The Rush ADCC supports a variety of timely and important areas of research including risk factors for the transition from normal aging to MCI to AD, the neurobiology of normal aging and MCI, and the use of neuroimaging, and contemporary omics technologies to identify novel therapeutic targets. These research areas are supported through the careful design and integration of six highly successful Cores: an Administrative Core; Clinical Core; Data Management and Statistics Core; Neuropathology Core; Outreach, Recruitment and Education Core; and Religious Orders Study Core. The Rush ADCC has been very successful in enrolling non-Latino whites and African Americans without dementia into the Clinical and Religious Orders Study Cores. Progress in the Latino community has been slower. Over the past project period, considerable effort has been devoted to relationship building in the Latino community by the Outreach, Recruitment, and Education Core to lay the foundation for a successful Latino Core at the Rush ADCC. The overall goals of the proposed revision to the Rush ADCC are to develop a Latino Core that will enroll and follow participants free of dementia at baseline, and generate data and ante- and post-mortem biospecimens, to support high quality, cutting edge, externally-funded studies that focus on the full spectrum of cognition in older Latinos. The proposed Latino Core will markedly extend the Aims of the Rush ADCC by ensuring its ability to support studies of the transition from normal aging to MCI to the earliest stages of dementia, of ante- and post-mortem biospecimens, and of biofluid and neuroimaging biomarkers in older Latinos without dementia. Further, the proposed Latino Core will markedly enhance the ability of the ADC community via the UDS and NACC to address scientific questions about aging and AD in the Latino population, especially as it relates to the pathophysiologic AD process and MCI due to AD that represent the earliest stages of the disease. Although the Latino community has not been a major focus of the Rush ADCC, considerable progress in the Latino community to date has set the stage for a highly successful Latino Core.
The treatment and prevention of AD in older Latinos is a public health imperative yet there are currently only about 700 Latinos without dementia in NACC and 20 autopsies without dementia. Thus, the proposed Latino Core which will enroll older Latinos without dementia who agree to annual evaluation and will seek autopsy will markedly enhance the ability of the Rush ADCC and of the wider ADC community to investigate the full spectrum of cognition and biospecimens among older Latinos.
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