Dear Readers, There are two notable updates in this week’s blog. First, The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Advisory Committee decided that it could not recommend approval of Amyvid™ (florbetapir) at this time based on the currently available data (13-3); but, voted unanimously (16-0) to recommend approval of Amyvid conditional on specialized training being instituted for the medical professionals who would administer it. They must train readers in a consistent technique, and then re-evaluate [...]

Researchers from the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, Sweden, report in last month’s issue of the journal Brain, on the postmortem examination of the first-ever person with Alzheimer’s to be followed prospectively by positron emission tomography using Pittsburgh Compound B (PIB-PET), which allows visualization of amyloid plaques. They analyzed the brain of a woman with Alzheimer’s who had volunteered for the first PET-PIB scan ever performed. She received an additional PIB scan two years later, and [...]

Dear Readers, About 750,000 people in the United States develop sepsis each year. Known in lay terms as blood poisoning, sepsis occurs when the bloodstream is overwhelmed with bacteria, usually in response to the body’s attempt to fight severe infection. Sepsis is a leading cause of death in hospital ICUs, and the elderly are particularly vulnerable to this life-threatening blood infection. The thinking had been that once the crisis is over, older people who survive [...]