In a rare occurrence, Speaker of the House Roger Hanshaw, R-Clay, came down from the podium to speak to House Bill 5014.
A heated and partisan debate in the House of Delegates took place Friday over border security in a resolution to support the state of Texas. But there was full bipartisan support of the Speaker’s bill to help with groundbreaking, disease curing medical efforts at WVU.
Acknowledging and supporting the state of Texas highlighted a lengthy House Concurrent Resolution 64 debate, showing West Virginia support for what Texas is doing, and proposes to do, to secure its border with Mexico.
An amendment to the resolution proposed by Democrats would have the House support the U.S. Congress as it continues to craft federal legislation regarding border security. With amendment objections noting the executive branch taking charge of border security, the amendment failed, 12-81 but the resolution supporting Texas passed 93-0.
In a rare occurrence, Speaker of the House Roger Hanshaw, R-Clay, came down from the podium to speak to House Bill 5014. The proposal calls for $2 million in funding for WVU’s Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute, where Hanshaw said the use of ultrasound to treat Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, PTSD and more is ready for clinical trials.
“We have an opportunity to continue leading the world,” Hanshaw said. “Not leading the nation, not leading the state, leading the world in delivering a groundbreaking treatment of therapeutic technology that was published two weeks ago in the New England Journal of Medicine, the world’s foremost journal for academic medicine, and delivering that technology to West Virginians who suffer from conditions that deserve our attention.”
On Monday Gov. Jim Justice signed House Bill 4276 into law, creating a West Virginia Parkinson’s registry. He said the data collection and research effort marks a new beginning to help eradicate a terrible ailment
There is no cure for Parkinson’s disease, but new efforts in West Virginia may help speed therapeutic research.
West Virginia is believed to have the nation’s third highest population with Parkinson’s disease. But that’s an estimate. The numbers may be higher. Experts say the research is lacking, and there is still too much unknown.
On Monday Gov. Jim Justice signed House Bill 4276 into law, creating a West Virginia Parkinson’s registry. He said the data collection and research effort marks a new beginning to help eradicate a terrible ailment.
“It is the first step to putting us on a pathway to solve the riddle,” Justice said.
George Manahan is a West Virginia business leader and activist who lives with Parkinson’s. He said the charting project will collect statewide data that medical experts say will lead to new research findings to help stop, slow or reverse Parkinson’s.
Manahan said the more than 7,000 West Virginians who also live with the degenerative brain disease can help provide answers.
“Our new registry will provide solid data of how many people in our state have the disease and where they live,” Manahan said. “We’re going to look for clusters. Are they in a certain location? Do they work in a certain industry? Hopefully the data will lead us to answer questions like what causes Parkinson’s disease, and can we find a cure.”
Manahan said the data collected will be used by in-state researchers that can enter into an agreement with another state registry. The data will also be sent to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, where it can be used by national and international researchers. Manahan said growing the database will widen the search for a cure.
Dr. Ali Rezai, of the WVU Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute will lead the registry effort. Along with WVU, registry research will include doctors and patients from Marshall University and Charleston Area Medical Center. Rezai said West Virginia is already a national Parkinson’s treatment leader.
“We have patients from 30 states come to West Virginia for the care of their Parkinson’s,” Rezai said. “We are leaders in the world for advanced therapeutics with deep brain stimulation, focused ultrasound, treating Parkinson’s tremor and gene therapy starting in a few months.”
West Virginia is the first state to partner with the Michael J.Fox Foundation in establishing a registry.
West Virginia is also the first Appalachian state and first rural area to have a Parkinson’s registry. Rezai said the work here is long overdue.
“Many of the studies are done in large metropolitan cities,” Rezai said. “It’s time to learn more about what happens to the Parkinson’s community in Appalachia and rural states.”
A typical day at Ruby Memorial Hospital in Morgantown has its stresses.
Curtis Ash, nursing manager in the hospital’s emergency department, knows that well. He supports about 160 staff, who themselves are caring for sick patients.
But in mid-March, the reality of being a frontline health care worker at Ruby, and across the United States, shifted as fears of the coronavirus and cases began to trickle in.
“We’re just like many other hospitals around the world,” he said.
For Ash, that meant his staff was suddenly putting themselves at risk daily. It also meant stress levels among hospital staff were running high. To help protect themselves from contracting the virus, health care workers are donning extra layers of personal protective equipment, such as gowns, masks and gloves.
That was when researchers at nearby West Virginia University wondered if there was a way to use the physiological experiences of health care workers to help determine if they had contracted the coronavirus, possibly before they themselves knew it.
About 150 health care workers in West Virginia were recruited to participate. They are wearing a smart ring – it looks like a wedding band – that collects data such as sleep patterns, oxygen levels and pulse rate. Participants also do twice-daily motor tests using a phone app. That data is fed into an artificial intelligence computer model developed by the Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute.
Credit Courtesy WVU RNI
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The Oura Ring tracker monitors an individual’s body temperature, breathing, heart rate and other vital signs
Dr. Ali Rezai, who serves as chair of the institute, said preliminary results show the model can predict when a health care worker is infected with the virus up to 24 hours before they show symptoms. Knowing who has the virus and when is essential to prevent future outbreaks, he said.
“We’re looking at a way that we can have an earlier way to detect if somebody is contagious with the COVID-19 virus, but is not symptomatic,” Rezai said. “The sooner we know this, the sooner we can forecast or predict who’s going to be exhibiting the symptoms, the more we can help in terms of limiting the spread.”
For the past two years, researchers at the institute have fed the data from 30,000 individuals into the predictive, AI model being used in this COVID-19 study. Broadly, the model looks to predict the “recovery, readiness and resilience” of humans in terms of their jobs or their current experience,” Rezai said.
For example, the model has been used to help predict if a person struggling with an opioid addiction would be more or less likely to have cravings or relapse.
Using the physiological data collected by the smart rings and daily motor tests, the model has been retooled to help predict the contraction of a virus such as COVID-19.
Researchers are working to expand the study to include hundreds of frontline health care workers across the country. Rezai said the study focused on this group of people not just because of they’re increased risk of getting the virus, but because of the personal toll this is taking on health care workers.
“Health care workers are under enormous stress and anxiety about exposure to a virus that there’s no treatment, there’s no vaccine for and very limited personal protective equipment,” Rezai said. “And they don’t know the risk themselves or to their families.”
Peace of mind for both her family and her patients was one reason Donna Tennant, admissions marketing director at the Sundale Nursing Home in Morgantown, decided to participate. Sundale has been hit hard by the coronavirus. Data from the West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources shows as of May 10, 39 residents and 15 staff have tested positive. Five people from the facility have died.
“We’re working it every day,” she said. “So, being able to see your levels [and] what’s happening, it gives you a little bit of a comfort knowing that you know, ‘yes, I’m okay right now.’”
Appalachia Health News is a project of West Virginia Public Broadcasting, with support from Marshall Health and Charleston Area Medical Center.
A West Virginia University neuroscientist says the movement to pursue mindfulness through meditation and other practices has grown more popular over the past two decades, but more precise definitions and research are needed concerning potential benefits.
Julie Brefczynski-Lewis, assistant professor in the WVU Rockefeller Neuroscience Institute, is co-author of a recent paper in Perspectives on Psychological Science. The paper reviews early research into practices related to attention, awareness, memory, retention, acceptance and discernment.
Mindfulness is defined as the quality or state of being conscious or aware of something. However, the authors say its meanings vary while writings have “saturated” scientific research and media, including some exaggerated claims.
They note one analysis of studies shows mindfulness programs can be moderately effective for anxiety, depression and pain.
