Parkinson’s Disease Foundation Makes $200K Grant To Parkinson Study Group

The Parkinson’s Disease Foundation (PDF) has announced a $200,000 award to the Parkinson Study Group (PSG) to fund new and innovative programs that facilitate the clinical research process so that treatments and therapies move at an accelerated rate from “bench to bedside.” The money was distributed as an Advancing Parkinson’s Treatments Innovations Grant.

“PDF is pleased to continue our work in advancing Parkinson’s therapies with this substantial grant to the Parkinson Study Group,” said Robin Elliott, Executive Director of PDF. “PSG’s excellent clinical work fits perfectly with our initiative to collaborate with people with Parkinson’s to get better therapies to market more quickly.”

Founded in 1985, PSG is a non-profit, cooperative group of Parkinson’s disease experts from medical centers in the US and Canada who are dedicated to improving treatment for people living with Parkinson’s disease, primarily by coordinating and managing clinical trials of promising new treatments. PDF has provided funding to PSG for the past four years, and has distributed nearly $1 million total to support the group’s important work.

This year’s grant of $200,000 will support retrospective “data-mining” projects that allow for secondary analyses of data with a larger clinical trial database that builds upon the purpose of the individual original trials, a mentored clinical research award for young clinical researchers, and training new investigators in developing and managing clinical trials.

“The PSG is particularly appreciative of the PDF support. This unique kind of collaboration provides the energy to launch new careers, new projects, and to bring new collaborators to the field of PD research,” said Karl Keiburtz, M.D., Chair of PSG.

PDF funding builds on previous funding provided to PSG to foster efficiencies in Parkinson’s data management through the integration of PD study databases among all the PSG research projects and for long-term data collection on Parkinson’s disease progression, treatment response, complications and outcomes through the FOUND (Follow-up of Persons with Neurologic Diseases) study. This project, run by Dr. Carolyn Tanner at The Parkinson’s Institute in Sunnyvale, CA, acquires data by following up with clinical trial participants after the end of a trial via questionnaires. Studies such as this can also help clinical investigators gather information about non-motor aspects of PD, which are often most troublesome to people living with Parkinson’s.

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