UKPDSTB General: Brain Bank Bulletin issue 1, page 1

Brain Bank Bulletin Issue 1
Winter 2003

The Parkinson's Disease Society (PDS) Tissue Bank at Imperial aims to help understand what causes Parkinson's and assist in the development of better drug treatments, by providing high quality brain tissue to researchers working in the field of Parkinson's and related neurological disorders. The Tissue Bank also strives to enhance the public's awareness of Parkinson's, promote the work of the Tissue Bank and increase the numbers of volunteers who are willing to sign up to the donor scheme. The Tissue Bank also aims to collect tissue in an ethical manner and in a way that it is most suitable for all research needs.

Welcome to the First PDS Tissue Bank Newsletter

Inside this issue:

Welcome 1

The Story so far 1

Open Day 2003 2

What Next of Kin can do! 2

Healthy Volunteers Needed! 3

Genetic Research 3

Branch Talks 4

Research Requests 4

Staff Information 4

Contact Information 4

The UK PDS Tissue Bank has been in operation for just over a year. This and future newsletters aim to acquaint you with the work and progress of the Tissue Bank as well as the staff you will come in to contact with. There will also be information on Tissue Bank events such as Open Days and talks planned for local PDS branch meetings etc.
We will run articles on specific needs of the Tissue Bank e.g. the need for healthy volunteers to sign up (Pg.2), and how the Tissue Bank can get the most benefit from your tissue donation (Pg.2). There will also be articles dedicated to answering readers' questions on topics ranging from the Tissue Bank and the donation process to how our brain works and how it helps us move!
Additionally, we will keep you informed of our latest research news. e.g. see Pg. 3 where Professor Graeber's team here at Imperial College is using donated brain tissue to compare gene expression between the Parkinson's brain and healthy brains.

We hope you enjoy reading the newsletter and find it informative. If you have any questions, comments or suggestions about the newsletter please do not hesitate to contact us. If your PDS branch would like some newsletters for its meetings do let us know!

Dr David Dexter
Scientific Director

The Story so far...

The Tissue Bank is funded by the Parkinson's Disease Society, UK

Thanks to all our registered donors and their families for all your support!

These figures show the success of the Tissue Bank to date in recruiting donors. In the graph, the first point on the upper line shows the number of prospective registered donors who transferred from the old Tissue Bank, the second point is these transferred donors plus those registering between January and July 2002. The remainder are the monthly totals as further people register. On average there are 12 new registrations per month. The lower line shows the number of cases (36) of tissue procurement to date, of which only one was from a control donor.

The pie chart demonstrates that of the approx 400 prospective donors currently registered, 62% are suffering from Parkinson's or a related disorder and 38% are healthy volunteers. We need to increase this percentage of "healthy" donors as even though they comprise 38% of the registered donors, we have still only had one case of tissue donation from a control donor.