AMWA Indiana Chapter Newsletter January 201 4
American Medical Writers Association Indiana Chapter 2013足2014
American Medical Wrtiters Association Indiana Chapter Newsletter
Officers
Editor
President
Barbara Lightfoot, CCRP
President-Elect
Gregory Adams, II
Section Editors
Secretary
Ellen Stoltzfus, PhD
Editing
Treasurer
Pam McClelland, PhD
David Caldwell, PhD
Gregory Adams, II Svetlana Dominguez, ELS
Freelance Committee Chairs
Esther Brooks-Asplund, PhD Karen Roberts
Education
Laura Town
Medical Device
William Pietrzak, PhD
Member Resources
Esther Brooks-Asplund, PhD
Pharmaceutical
Esther Brooks-Asplund, PhD
Program
Gregory Adams, II
Publications
David Caldwell, PhD
Social Media
Linda Hughes, MA
Daniela Ilijevski, PhD Publication
Ellen Stoltzfus, PhD Qing Zhou, PhD
Coming Attractions Friday & Saturday, June 6 & 7
AMWA Indiana Chapter Conference Location: TBA Thursday, February 6, 6足8 pm
Thursday, March 6, 6足8 pm
Using E足Learning Tools to Create Effective Presentations
Writing a Clinical Study Report
Laura Williams Town
Katherin M Ruiz
The February and March events are free and will be held at the Milano Inn 231 S College Ave, Indianapolis, IN 46202. Dinner is optional and at each person's expense.
Links AMWA AMWA LinkedIn
AMWA Twitter
AMWA Indiana Chapter AMWA Indiana Chapter LinkedIn Global English for Everyone Blog LG Hughes Blog
AMWA Facebook
Please let us hear your voice! Let us know if there is anything we can do to help you benefit professionally from your AMWA membership. Volunteering to help our chapter or national association is a great way to have fun while meeting some wonderful people, improving yourself and the profession, and becoming and being the leader you were meant to be. Join our LinkedIn group, come to the chapter events, or click on the name of a chapter officer or committee chair above to join the conversation about medical communication and our chapter.
Contents
4 6 10 12 15 21
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From the President, AMWA Indiana Chapter
Barbara Lightfoot, CCRP
Interview with Elaine Crabtree, MA, ELS
David Caldwell, PhD
Summary: 401(k) Plans for Freelances
Esther Brooks-Asplund, PhD
Indiana’s Medical Device Industry Opportunities for Medical Writers (Part I)
William S. Pietrzak, PhD
Summary: Plain by design: Evidencebased plain language
David Caldwell, PhD
Report: Shifting Paradigms on Alzheimer's Disease Symposium
Karen Roberts
Cover
Location by zip code of our 88 chapter members in Indiana. The map was created with BatchGeo. Find AMWA members near you by searching the AMWA member directory by city or zip code.
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From the President, AMWA Indiana Chapter
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FROM THE PRESIDENT, AMWA INDIANA CHAPTER Welcome to the 2013 – 2014 year for the AMWA Indiana Chapter. I am honored to serve as President of the AMWA Indiana Chapter. I would first like to thank David Caldwell, the 2012 – 2013 President, for his leadership, hard work, and commitment to our chapter. I would also like to thank our current and former chapter officers, committee chairs, and volunteers for their commitment and continued support. We have an exciting year planned that includes the following: Regional educational/networking events Indianapolis 06 Feb, 2014 Dinner program at the Milano Inn from 6:00 - 8:00 p.m.: “E-Learning Tools to Create Effective Presentations” to be presented by Laura Town (President, WilliamsTown Communications). RSVP by 30 Jan 2014. 06 Mar, 2014 Dinner program at the Milano Inn from 6:00 - 8:00 p.m.: “Writing a Clinical Study Report (CSR)” to be presented by Kathy Ruiz (Eli Lilly and Company). RSVP by 26 Feb 2014. Additional events will be held around the state and event information will be posted. We encourage you to hold educational/networking events in your area of the state. If you would like to host a regional event please provide your event information to Greg Adams, President-Elect and Program Committee Chair. Indiana/Ohio Valley Chapters Conference June 6 – 7, 2014: Hold these dates to attend the Indiana/Ohio Valley Chapters Conference. Conference planning is currently underway. We plan to offer workshops and open sessions. Please submit ideas concerning topics of interest for open sessions to Laura Town, Education Committee Chair.
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From the President, AMWA Indiana Chapter
Chapter Newsletter We have a new format for our Chapter Newsletter that includes section headings for different areas of medical communication. If you wish to contribute to a section, please provide your contributions to the respective Section Editor. LinkedIn Group The chapter has a LinkedIn group. Chapter members are asked to post useful tips that would be of value to the membership and are also asked to post questions that can be responded to by our membership. If you have questions regarding getting started in the LinkedIn Group please contact Linda Hughes, Social Media Chair. To our chapter volunteers - None of these efforts would be possible without your commitment. THANK YOU! To our membership – Please let us know if there is anything we can do to assist you in your professional development or if you are interested in volunteering at the chapter level. We are here to help and are waiting to hear from you. Sincerely, Barbara O. Lightfoot, President
AMWA Indiana Chapter
Barbara O. Lightfoot
(barbara.lightfoot@yahoo.com)
Lead at the 2014 AMWA Annual Conference
Submit your proposal to lead an open session (due February 28), roundtable, or poster (due March 21 ).
January 201 4 | AMWA Indiana Chapter Newsletter | 5
Interview With Elaine Crabtree
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Interview With Elaine Crabtree, MA, ELS
This telephone interview was conducted by David Caldwell on December 1 3, 201 3 for the AMWA Indiana chapter newsletter (AICN). Elaine Crabtree (elaine.crabtree@inventivhealth.com) David Caldwell (davidccaldwell@att.net)
AICN: Elaine, congratulations on being honored with the 2013 AMWA President’s Award by Douglas Haneline! That’s a service award, isn’t it? MS. CRABTREE: Yes. AICN: How have you served the association? MS. CRABTREE: With our chapter, I was secretary for several years, president, program committee chair, and delegate to a few national board of directors meetings. At the national level, I was on the membership committee, proofread the AMWA Journal for several years, was a member of, and chaired, the book awards committee (public or heath care consumers category), and gave a presentation based on an abstract I submitted for an annual conference. AICN: Why did you join AMWA?
Douglas Haneline and Elaine Crabtree Photo reprinted with permission of the AMWA Journal
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MS. CRABTREE: I joined 17 years ago when I became a medical writer because I had good experiences with other professional organizations. I remained because national activities interested me and helped me grow as a writer. I was able to see how the organization worked, see how books were judged, meet fellow writers from across the country, and pick up useful tips for my career and for our chapter. My employers told me they were impressed by the AMWA certificates that I earned in basic skills, science & medicine, and advanced skills. Those
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Interview With Elaine Crabtree
accomplishments were evidence of my continued interest in learning new things. I like the variety of activities and medical writing represented in AMWA. I like having the opportunity to customize my AMWA experience—to make it what I want it to be—and to meet other medical writers. AICN: Have you noticed any trends in the association since you joined?
"I like having the opportunity to customize my AMWA experience"
MS. CRABTREE: AMWA has become more useful to people throughout their careers. For instance, when I first joined, only the basic skills certificate program was available. People would join AMWA, earn the certificate, then either leave or stop going to conferences. Now, the variety of workshops gives everyone new things to learn. Even though AMWA doesn’t certify that a person is well trained in an area, these workshops are still a good way to help yourself grow. AICN: Could we talk a little about your career? What area do you work in? MS. CRABTREE: I work in pharmaceutical writing at inVentiv Health. AICN: How do you stay current in your field? MS. CRABTREE: AMWA is my main source of information. But I also learn from various medical journals, online newsletters from various groups, and pharmaceutical news. AICN: What is your educational background? MS. CRABTREE: I knew since junior high school that I wanted to be a writer. I earned a BA in English composition from DePauw University and an MA in journalism from Ball State University. I also became a certified editor in the life sciences by passing the BELS exam. As an undergraduate, I took an elective class in emergency medicine because it sounded interesting. That led to 5
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Interview With Elaine Crabtree
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years of full-time employment as an emergency medical technician and paramedic, which gave me a decent medical vocabulary and a good idea of what basic patient care is like. AICN: It seems that every medical writer has a unique career path. What’s yours?
"I didn't have any formal training in medical writing before becoming a medical writer."
MS. CRABTREE: Universities taught me how to write and employers taught me how to write medical documents. After graduating from DePauw, I was an EMT/paramedic for 5 years. I worked part time as a journalist for the Muncie Star while studying journalism at Ball State, full time in the Ball State public relations office for 6 years, and spent a short time with the American Camping Association in Indianapolis. I did some freelance work for a while before being hired by the publications office of Indiana University School of Medicine. There I was 75% editor and 25% writer, helping to create educational materials for patients (booklets, brochures, and videos), medical students, and physicians (booklets, videos, and text books). I moved to St. Vincent hospital where I mostly wrote grant applications, but also helped coach residents on how to write a journal article. Then MedFocus (currently inVentiv Health, where I am now) hired me to do some contract pharmaceutical writing. I didn’t have any formal training in medical writing before becoming a medical writer. I really learned on the job. AICN: What skills do you need to do your job? MS. CRABTREE: Writing skills, of course, but also lots of project management skills. It’s very helpful to understand the basics of how research works, how studies are designed. I use standard word processing software and proprietary databases. AICN: How do you keep your job fresh? MS. CRABTREE: Every project is different, so there is always something new to learn. I’m not stamping out the same part on an assembly line every day.
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Interview With Elaine Crabtree
AICN: How do you approach a writing assignment on a topic you know little about? MS. CRABTREE: I start with information the client provides and then search online for related journal articles and other sources of information.
"I'm not stamping out the same part ... every day."
AICN: What is it like to work for a contract research organization? MS. CRABTREE: It’s like working for any large company. My manager assigns me to projects and I work directly with clients on their projects. Sometimes the client determines my timeline. But usually I drive the timeline because it’s my job to know how long each step of a project takes. If my client wants a shorter timeline, we work together to see what can and can’t be done and negotiate which steps to omit. AICN: How do you succeed in using referred authority to persuade colleagues and clients to do what you need them to do? MS. CRABTREE: I try to be as diplomatic as possible in figuring out with others how we can work together to get something done. I’ve found that there is always a way to solve a problem. AICN: What’s your secret to communicating well? MS. CRABTREE: I don’t have any secrets. I try to always keep my audience in mind and produce my message in a way that speaks to my audience. AICN: You are a singer, too. Does that hobby reflect your interest in communication or is the association just coincidental? MS. CRABTREE: It’s just a coincidence.
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Summary:
401 (k) Plans for Freelances
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Summary 401(k) Plans for Freelances
by Esther Brooks-Asplund, PhD, owner Hoosier Medical Communication Services, Bloomington, IN (esther.asplund@att.net) Adapted from the 201 3 AMWA Annual Conference roundtable, Discussion Leader: Jeanne McAdara-Berkowitz, PhD, Biolexica Health Science Communications, LLC, Longmont, CO (jeanne.berkowitz@biolexica.com)
Esther Brooks-Asplund
"A selfemployed individual may contribute more into an i401 (k) compared with a SEP IRA"
What is a Qualified Retirement Plan (QRP)? A QRP is an investment eligible for certain tax benefits because it meets certain requirements of the US Internal Revenue Code. Examples of QRPs include, but are not limited to, individual retirement accounts (IRAs), 401(k)s, qualified annuities and pensions. QRPs can reduce current or post-retirement taxable income and are protected in the event of financial disaster (eg, bankruptcy). However, these plans have stiff penalties for taking early distributions. Self-employed QRPs have higher contribution limits than plans for individuals, are available through most brokerage and investment firms, and can include mutual funds within one family, multiple mutual funds and stocks, real estate, tax liens, gold, and other investments. Bottom Line: At the same income level, a self-employed individual may contribute more into an i401(k) compared with a SEP IRA. Resources: • Beacon Capital Management Advisors. SEP IRA vs. Individual 401k. BCMA website. http://www.sepira.com/sep-ira-vs-individual-401k.html. Accessed 17 November 2013. • Internal Revenue Service. One-participant 401(k) Plans. Last updated: 31 October 2013 http://www.irs.gov/Retirement-Plans/One-Participant-401(k)-Plans Accessed 17 November 2013. • Robertson,S. Individual 401(k)s May Offer Self-Employed More Advantages Than a SEP IRA. 14 June 2011. Fox Business Small Business Center website. http://smallbusiness.foxbusiness.com/entrepreneurs/2011/06/14/individual-401ksmay-offer-self-employed-more-advantages-than-sep-ira/ Accessed 17 November 2013.
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Summary:
401 (k) Plans for Freelances
Disclaimer: Your choice of a retirement savings plan will result in long-term financial and tax consequences that are dependent on your individual situation. The information presented above is for information purposes and does not constitute professional financial, tax, or legal advice. Please consult a professional tax or financial advisor to determine the best savings strategy for your personal situation.
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Indiana's Medical Device Industry
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Indiana’s Medical Device Industry Opportunities for Medical Writers (Part I) by William S. Pietrzak, PhD (billsp@uic.edu)
William Pietrzak
The medical device industry represents a huge, latent opportunity for medical writers accustomed to serving the pharmaceutical industry. It may surprise you to know that in 2012, BioCrossroads released a report stating that the Indiana medical device industry was the fifth largest in the country, generating $10 billion annually and employing over 20,000 people. The first step needed to tap into this opportunity is to become familiar with the medical device companies in our state. By way of introduction, I am a relatively new AMWA member, having joined the association last year. I have worked in the medical device sector for over 35 years, with the last 25 years in Indiana at Biomet. While I have been involved with research, development, and marketing over my career, my focus over the past 10 years has been medical writing.
"In 201 2 ... the Indiana medical device industry was the fifth largest in the country"
To help identify the principal medical device companies in Indiana, I consulted the Indiana Medical Device Manufacturer’s Council website and excluded companies whose prime, or sole, focus was drugs, consulting, patient-care, original equipment manufacturer (OEM) component production, contract manufacturing, and testing. Eleven companies remained which are described below. Geographically, the companies tend to be clustered in the north around Warsaw (the Orthopedic Capital of the World®) and in the center of the state in the Indianapolis/Bloomington/Spencer area. Missing are the myriad small and start-up device companies in the state which likely don’t have internal medical writers and may be eager to receive such help. The devices pretty much run the gamut, with applications in orthopedics, the spine, tissue repair/ wound healing, interventional cardiology, the heart, the vascular system, diagnostics, general surgery, and others.
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Indiana's Medical Device Industry
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From experience I can say that each major area of medical device technology is a world unto itself, each having its own purpose, design, risks/benefits, anatomical considerations, and vernacular. Depending on one’s background, it might be easier for a given medical writer to transition to device writing in one area rather than another. Certainly there is quite a potpourri of device categories/companies in Indiana to choose from. Of course, you don’t have to limit yourself to Indiana medical device companies, but as you can see, there is ample opportunity right in our own back yard! In the next newsletter, we’ll take a look at the types of medical writing relevant to devices.
"Each major area of medical device technology is a world unto itself."
Summary of Major Medical Device Companies in Indiana and Their Representative Products Bayer Diagnostics Corporation (Indianapolis) Diabetes care (blood glucose monitoring), diagnostic imaging (MRI equipment, contrast agents/media, etc.) Biomet, Inc. (Warsaw) Orthopedic (total joint prosthesis), spinal fixation, trauma fixation, electrical bone growth stimulation, craniofacial fixation, dental prosthesis, biologics, sports medicine Boston Scientific (Spencer) Interventional cardiology (balloon catheters, diagnostic catheters, stents), cardiac (pacemakers, defibrillators), peripheral interventions (balloon catheters, stents) Cook Biotech, Inc. (West Lafayette) Tissue repair matrices, hernia repair grafts, tissue patches Cook Group (Bloomington) Anesthesiology, colorectal surgery, critical care medicine, electrophysiology, embryology, emergency medicine, gastroenterology, general surgery, gynecology, interventional cardiology, interventional radiology
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Indiana's Medical Device Industry
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DePuy/Synthes (Johnson & Johnson) (Warsaw) Orthopedic (total joint prosthesis), spinal fixation, trauma fixation, craniofacial fixation, dental prosthesis, biologics, sports medicine, neurovascular Medtronic Spinal & Biologics (Warsaw - manufacturing division, Memphis - headquarters) Spinal fusion systems, artificial cervical discs, biologic bone grafts OrthoPediatrics (Warsaw) Plates, screws, and nails for pediatric orthopedic patients Roche Diagnostics Corp. (Indianapolis) A variety of diagnostic products including anticoagulation assay, and for research.
blood
glucose,
Symmetry Medical Inc. (Warsaw) Orthopedic and spinal implants, instruments, and cases Zimmer Inc. (Warsaw) Orthopedic (total joint prosthesis), spinal fixation, trauma fixation, dental prosthesis, biologics, sports medicine
Doctorate in Health Communication The Department of Communication Studies in the IU School of Liberal Arts at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis is now accepting applications for its newest post-graduate degree program, a doctorate in health communication, which opens in fall 2014. The application deadline is Feb. 1.
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Plain by Design
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5 Skills All Great Writers Embrace from Beyond the rules: creating great writers not just legal writers Authors: Adam Lamparello, JD, LLM and Charles E. MacLean, JD Indiana Tech Law School (Ft. Wayne, IN) “If you don’t have time to read, you don’t have the time (or the tools) to write. Simple as that.” -Stephen King “To be the kind of writer you want to be, you must first be the kind of thinker you want to be.” -Ayn Rand “Know the rules well so you can break them effectively” -The Dalai Lama “Always carry a notebook . . . short-term memory only retains information for three minutes; unless it is committed to paper you can lose an idea forever.” -Will Self “If it sounds like writing . . . rewrite it.” -Elmore Leonard
Summary Plain by design: Evidencebased plain language
Adapted by David Caldwell (davidccaldwell@att.net), at the suggestion of Greg Adams (greg.adams@cookmedical.com), from Plain by design: Evidencebased plain language, a presentation by Karen Schriver,PhD (kschriver@earthlink.net) on October 1 2, 201 3 at the Plain Language Association International 201 3 conference in Vancouver, Canada. View the presentation
We can make life easier for our audiences if we learn how they read and how we write. The study of plain language—information our audiences can find and understand the first time they experience it—helps us do both. Karen Schriver summarized the results of key behavioral experiments that teach us what plain language is.
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Plain by Design Results of Plain Language Research
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Plain by Design
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Plain by Design
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References Camerer C, Loewenstein G, and Weber, M. (1989) The curse of knowledge in economic settings: an experimental analysis. Journal of Political Economy 97(5): 1232-1254. Charrow RP and Charrow VR.
(1979)
Making legal language understandable: A psycholinguistic study of jury
instructions. Columbia Law Review 79: 1306-1374. Coleman EB. (1965) Learning of prose written in four grammatical transformations. Journal of Applied Psychology 49(5): 332-341. Coleman, EB and Blumenfeld, JP. (1963) Cloze scores of nominalizations and their grammatical transformations using active verbs. Psychological Reports 13: 651-654 DeLoache, JS and Marzolf DP. (1992) When a picture is not worth a thousand words: Young children's understanding of pictures and models. Cognitive Development 7(3): 317-329. Evans, J. (1996) On the mental representation of conditional sentences. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology: Section A 49(4): 1086-1114. Felker DB. (1980)
Document design: A review of the relevant research.
Washington, DC: American Institutes for
Research. Haas, C. (1989) Does the medium make a difference? Two studies of writing with pen and paper and with computers. Human-Computer Interaction: 4: 149-169. Haas, C. (1996) Writing technology: Studies on the materiality of literacy. Mawah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum. Hardt-Davidson, W. (2013) What are the work patterns of technical communication? In J. Johnson-Eiola and S. Selber (eds), Solving problems in technical communication (pp 50-54). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Hayes JR and Bajzek D. (2008) Understanding and Reducing the Knowledge Effect: Implications for Writers. Written Communication 25(1): 104-118. Hinds PJ.
(1999) The curse of expertise: The effects of expertise and debiasing methods on prediction of novice
performance. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied 5(2): 205-221. Holland, VM and Rose, A. (1980) A case study: Complex instructions. In DB Felker (ed) Document design: A review of the relevant research (pp 111-124). Washington, DC: American Institutes for Research. Johnson-Laird, PN. (1975)
Models of deduction.
In F. Falmagne (ed), Reasoning: Representation and processes in
children and adults. Hillsdale, NJ: Elbaum. Larkin, JH and Simon, HA. (1987) Why a diagram is (sometimes) worth ten thousand words. Cognitive Science 11: 6599. Leijten M, Van Waes L, Schriver K, and Hayes JR. (in press) Writing in the workplace: Constructing documents using multiple digital resources. Journal of Writing Research. Lindgaard G, Fernandes G, Dudek C, and Brown J. (2006) Attention web designers: You have 50 milliseconds to make a good first impression! Behavior and Information Technology 25(2): 115-126. Mayer RE and Gallini JK. (1990) When is an illustration worth ten thousand words. Journal of Educational Psychology 82(4): 715-726. Redish JC, Chisnell DE, Newby E, Laskowski SJ, and Lowry SZ. (2009) Report of findings: Use of language in ballot instructions. NIST Interagency/Internal Report (NISTIR) 7556.
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Schriver KA. (1997) Dynamics in document design: Creating texts for readers. John Wiley & Sons (New York, NY). Schriver KA. (2012) What we know about expertise in professional communication. In V. W. Berninger (ed) Past, present, and future contributions of cognitive writing research to cognitive psychology (pp. 275-312). Psychology Press (New York, NY). Schriver KA. (2013) What do technical communicators need to know about information design? In J. Johnson-Eilola and S. Selber (eds) Solving problems in technical communication (pp. 386-427).
University of Chicago Press
(Chicago, IL). Schriver KA. (manuscript in preparation) Information design for print and web: Evidence-based practice. Schriver KA. Technical
(in preparation) report,
KSA
The persistence of plain language in the United States: A history from 1940-2012.
Communication
Design
&
Research,
Pittsburgh,
PA.
Will
be
available
at
http://centerforplainlanguage.org. Slattery S. (2007) Undistributing work through writing: How technical writers manage texts in complex information environments. Technical Communication Quarterly 16(3): 311-325. Swarts J. (2010) Recycled writing: Assembling actor networks from reusable content. Journal of Business and Technical Communication 24(2): 127-163. Swarts J. (2013) How can work tools shape and organize technical communication. In J. Johnson-Eilola and S. Selber (eds) Solving problems in technical communication (pp. 146-164). University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL). Willows DM. (1978) A picture is not always worth a thousand words: Pictures as distractors in reading. Journal of Educational Psychology 70(2): 255-262.
Additional resources Global English for everyone Greg Adams and Matthew Kaul—When plain language isn’t enough: Plain language and Global English at a global healthcare company (PLAIN 2013) Guidelines for document designers howto.gov Making Health Communication Programs Work NIH plain language training Pfizer Principles for Clear Health Communication Plain Language Association International (PLAIN) Plainlanguage.gov/ Plain language toolkit Plain writing act of 2010 Research-Based Web Design & Usability Guidelines Usability.gov
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Tips
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Tips for Writing Precisely
Adapted from by Iva Cheung's "Greg Adams and Matthew Kaul—When plain language isn’t enough: Plain language and Global English at a global healthcare company (PLAIN 201 3)"
Make your sentences semantically complete. Don’t omit syntactic cues such as articles. Avoid ambiguous punctuation. Is a phrase set off by dashes a definition, interjection, or clarification? Avoid -ing words. Making words function as many different parts of speech leads to ambiguity. Be consistent with your terminology. Use unambiguous words: “when” instead of “once”, “although” instead of “while.” Avoid broad-reference and ambiguous pronouns. Give your pronouns clear antecedents.
Other Resources New to medical writing? Take a look at AMWA's Toolkit for New Medical Writers. Need advice on starting or growing your business? SCORE can help. Columbia University law school offers advice on how to Keep Your Copyrights.
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Alzheimer's Symposium
TOC Report: Shifting Paradigms on Alzheimer's Disease Symposium
by Karen Roberts, medical communication consultant (Kroberts.pr@att.net)
"I spent a day with front line researchers"
This local all-day symposium on December 3, co-organized by Eli Lilly and Co. and Nature Medicine, welcomed me as a freelance medical writer. The program featured international thought leaders from Harvard University School of Medicine, Washington University, University of Minnesota, University of Pennsylvania, and other institutions. An editor from Nature and leaders from Lilly’s neuroscience and early clinical development groups moderated the sessions. Note: Lilly is celebrating 25 years of Alzheimer’s research. Writing about neurologic diseases and differential diagnosis is one of my beats, so I had a vested interest in this program. I’m not sure how many other AMWA members attended but I did see our chapter president, Barbara Lightfoot. This excerpt of highlights underscores the value of our chapter newsflash. By accepting the advertised invitation to this symposium, I feel light-years ahead on my background research. I spent a day with front line researchers who are making scientific, evidence-based breakthroughs. Listening to the presentations first hand, taking copious notes, and being able to ask questions at the breaks was a multi-dimensional experience that surpasses any webinar or digital mining of information. At lunch, my table randomly selected, was full of IU med students. We had a very interactive conversation about how medical writers transcend the various fields of medicine and elevate communication across many platforms. Several students expressed a lot of interest in our career choice and asked how they might become more adept at our skill set. Here I felt I could give back with a bit of mentoring and encouragement. We talked about the benefits of bolstering their medical curriculum with “communications” coursework and AMWA’s resources for continuing education.
"Several students expressed a lot of interest in our career choice"
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Alzheimer's Symposium
TOC Admittedly, after a concentrated day of writing prone over my laptop and cranking out content, I felt “brain dead” and wondered if I had Alzheimer’s. Maybe you’ve had those days too? But I left the symposium assured that knowledge is powerful and I now feel very optimistic about the potential to treat AD. This symposium underscored the tremendous opportunities for collaborating to understand and treat AD, one of the top six most prevalent diseases and the only one with no cure or prevention. Here are a few excerpts from the symposium. Time on the planet, not a particular age, is a key pathogenic factor for AD. Oligomers and plaques both seem to contribute to AD. Identification of four behavioral symptoms (processing speed, fluid reasoning, working memory and recall memory) is still part of the diagnostic work-up.
"Time on the planet ... is a key pathogenic factor for AD"
Genome studies are revealing new and important clues to the causes of AD. To learn more about the “next generation” of genomic sequencing, follow the work of Alison Goate (U. Washington). All individuals with Down Syndrome develop AD if they live long enough. About 40% of patients with late onset AD (diagnosed at age > 65 years) have a first degree relative with AD. The most commonly mutated gene in AD patients (80%) is presenilin 1. Having glycine instead of glutamic acid at position 318 of the apolipoprotein E variant 4 gene increases the risk of developing AD by 10-fold. Several variants of the phospholipase D3 gene increase the odds of developing AD in African-Americans (5.48-fold) and in European-Americans (2.75-fold) (Cruchaga, et al. Nature). On the bright side, having threonine instead of alanine at position 673 of the amyloid precursor protein has a protective effect against developing AD (Jonsson, et al. Nature 488: 96-99, 2012). Lack of knowledge about which amyloid-beta oligomers contribute to AD is a barrier to developing medications that can effectively block the mechanism of AD. Recent advances in research on amyloid-related protein assemblies (fibrils and
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Alzheimer's Symposium
TOC oligomers) may help break that barrier. Future clinical trials would benefit from a really good capturing agent that could show over decades the development of a “toxic halo” of amyloid-related protein assemblies in brains of AD patients. Several researchers are studying the relation of amyloid deposits to measures of cognitive deficiency. The Alzheimer's Association Research Roundtable 2011 guidelines focused on: 1. Dementia due to AD; 2. Mild Cognitive impairment due to AD; and 3. Preclinical AD. An ongoing DIAN (dominantly inherited Alzheimer network) study—designed to identify biomarkers that predict the development of Alzheimer's disease in people who carry an Alzheimer's genetic mutation—has evidence that brain scans detect amyloid plaques 10+ years before the behavioral onset of AD. A method for detecting the AD-associated 42 amino acid species of amyloid-beta in cerebrospinal fluid, based on mass spectrometric quantification using selected reaction monitoring, provides a reliable index of AD neuropathology in late stages of AD development. Amyloid-beta positron emission tomography (PET) imaging is also improving the ability to diagnose AD. Attempts to discover biomarkers of AD in body fluids are underway and a lot of new data will be available soon. For example, a repository of 272,000 samples of cerebrospinal fluid from AD patients is available to investigators. Overall, better diagnostic tools are needed; 7-17% of AD autopsies show no clinical evidence of AD pathology, suggesting that more accurate diagnosis could help some AD patients achieve a better quality of life. Experts at this symposium emphasized that treating AD before behavioral symptoms appear might improve outcomes. Delaying those symptoms by 5 years would improve overall public health and ease the financial burden of AD.
"Other gems buried in the chapter newsflash may be just what you need to bolster your own continuing education"
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